Subscribe"...Shvarts insists her concept was not designed for 'shock value.' 'I hope it inspires some sort of discourse,' Shvarts said. 'Sure, some people will be upset with the message and will not agree with it, but it's not the intention of the piece to scandalize anyone.'
...she said she believes it is the nature of her piece to 'provoke inquiry.'
'I believe strongly that art should be a medium for politics and ideologies, not just a commodity," Shvarts said. "I think that I'm creating a project that lives up to the standard of what art is supposed to be.'"
Also: anyone who thinks that "right" and "wrong" apply to art may need to go back to school, maybe take an art class, do a little water color... I don't know. Something.So, As long as I call it "art," I can do whatever I want? Sweet!
Now there is a suitemate from hell. I can just see the passive aggressive notes.
SOMEONE needs to start CLEANING up after their MISCARRIAGES in the bathtub because OTHER PEOPLE USE THE BATHTUB AND DO NOT WANT TO RINSE VISCERA OFF OF THEIR FEET ALL THE TIME. Thank you!!!!
"I believe strongly that art should be a medium for politics and ideologies, not just a commodity," Shvarts said. "I think that I'm creating a project that lives up to the standard of what art is supposed to be."That's a false dilemma. She's saying that art has to be either 'a commodity' OR 'a medium for politics and ideologies'. Which is of course clearly untrue: art doesn't have to be anything in particular at all, and it certainly does not have to be one of those two things.
Joyce defines Improper Art as kinetic and breaks it down into two categories: the pornographic and the didactic. Pornographic art is any expression that inspires desire in the observer to possess the object. All advertising art is pornographic in this sense and therefore improper.Here's where it's really interesting, and where this young student's perspective is limited:
The second category of Improper Art, in Joyce's aesthetic, is the Didactic. Didactic Art is any artistic expression which instills fear or loathing in the observer and thereby pushes them away from the object being observed.
All comedy is didactic, at the least the best comedy is. All tragedy is didactic and all social expressions of anger are didactic.
[Most] art produced since World War II...is improper in Joyce's sense because it has been inherently kinetic--suffused with internal movement that either pulls the observer toward it in a desire to possess or pushes the observer away with fear or loathing.Artistically speaking, we've all grown up in a time in which so much art and artistic impulse has been co-opted by commerce that it can be (was for me, at least) very difficult to arrive at a conceptualization of art and its media of expression that is bigger than what my culture is drowning in--as pointed up by the rest of Joyce's ideas on this:
Joyce defines proper art as that which does not pull the observer toward it or push the observer away from it, but rather holds them still in aesthetic arrest of the moment. [Static art.]I'm not arguing here for or against Joyce's views on art, but I think it points up that there are much broader (and, in my opinion, more substantial) views of what art is and can be than are common to contemporary American culture, and certainly than are in evidence in the work under discussion here.
In this definition, if a work of art is true, it uses the forms of time and space in terms of contemporary life (people, objects, and their relationships to each other) to blow apart the illusory divisions that allow us to exist as individuals who are born from the great blank, grow old through similar stages of life, and die back into the great blank.
The novel is the story of a traveling circus run by Aloysius "Al" Binewski and his wife, "Crystal" Lil. When Al's circus begins to fail, the couple devise an idea to breed their own freak show, using various drugs and radioactive material to alter the genes of their children.I love that book. This art project? Not so much.
"The university would not confirm whether the News’s article was accurate, only that it had appeared in the paper. An e-mail message to Ms. Shvarts and a call to the editor of the newspaper were not immediately returned."
"...Juan Castillo, a senior art major who saw Shvarts present the work in progress, said in a telephone interview that her artwork has been oversimplified and sensationalized. 'It's a much more complex project,' he said, with a powerful message as well as technically polished and impressive sculpture.
He didn't want to put words in her mouth -- she has not responded to requests for interviews today -- but said she had described it to the class as a feminist work. 'It's supposed to challenge the mythology of the body,' he said. 'Are we only supposed to do what our bodies were "naturally" meant to do, which is to procreate? It's both an argument for women's reproductive rights and, I guess, an argument for the acceptance of homosexual sex as well.'
'I think she was definitely trying to spark conversation -- in that respect, she's accomplished her goal,' Castillo said. 'But I don't know if she meant it to get this crazy, this out of control.'"*
The probability of conceiving after one act of unprotected intercourse is relatively low and varies based on when during the menstrual cycle intercourse occurs. There is a possibility of conception when intercourse takes place within the 5 days before or on the estimated date of ovulation. Probabilities of conception after a single act of unprotected intercourse range from 10% when intercourse occurs 5 days before ovulation to 33% when it occurs on the day of ovulation.So, there is no reason whatsoever to assume that because she inseminated herself, she became pregnant. The article mentions no pregnancy test.
When attempting to dislodge pregnancy causing the uterus to contract is desirable. Blue Cohosh can be used by itself or combined with other herbs. It is commonly used with Pennyroyal, an herb with abortifacient qualities and/or Black Cohosh, which will help to soften the cervix and relax the os, it also encourages coordinated uterine contractions and according to some sources black cohosh is used to temper the intensity of blue cohosh's contractibility.
However, my personal attempts to terminate pregnancy with blue cohosh, pennyroyal and black cohosh were not successful, and over the course of time that I have been maintaining this website I've seen some mixed results.
Miscarriage occurs in about 15-20% of all recognized pregnancies, and usually occurs before the 13th week of pregnancy. The actual percentage of miscarriages is estimated to be as high as 50% of all pregnancies, since many miscarriages occur without the woman ever having known she was pregnant. Of those miscarriages that occur before the eighth week, 30% have no fetus associated with the sac or placenta. This condition is called blighted ovum, and many women are surprised to learn that there was never an embryo inside the sac.Not only are about half of all pregnancies terminated by the body without any assistance at all, but many legally prescribed hormonal birth control regimens also cause miscarriages by changing the texture of the uterine lining so that the fertized egg cannot implant. Are those abortions? Some say they are. In any case, whether they are or not, they are not morally different from using herbal treatments on a comparable time schedule to achieve the same effect.
Some miscarriages occur before women recognize that they are pregnant. About 15% of fertilized eggs are lost before the egg even has a chance to implant (embed itself) in the wall of the uterus. A woman would not generally identify this type of miscarriage. Another 15% of conceptions are lost before eight weeks' gestation. Once fetal heart function is detected in a given pregnancy, the chance of miscarriage is less than 5%.
"Ms. Shvarts is engaged in performance art. Her art project includes visual representations, a press release and other narrative materials. She stated to three senior Yale University officials today, including two deans, that she did not impregnate herself and that she did not induce any miscarriages. The entire project is an art piece, a creative fiction designed to draw attention to the ambiguity surrounding form and function of a woman’s body.
She is an artist and has the right to express herself through performance art.
Had these acts been real, they would have violated basic ethical standards and raised serious mental and physical health concerns."
"My four-year-old could have done that."Interestingly, this is one art installation that will certainly defy anyone to critique its merit in THAT regard, eh?
The general reverence towards Roman/Greek antiquity in European society at the time meant that the work of those artists meant that their productions were often seen as status symbols.This general reverence was also a political statement, allowing the patrons to latch on the "grand old times".
“…in a guest column published in Friday's student newspaper, Shvarts describes her ‘repeated self-induced miscarriages,’ although she allows that she never knew if she was actually pregnant.University calls art project a fiction; Shvarts '08 disputes Yale's claim.
‘The most poignant aspect of this representation — the part most meaningful in terms of its political agenda (and, incidentally, the aspect that has not been discussed thus far) — is the impossibility of accurately identifying the resulting blood,’ she said.
‘Because the miscarriages coincide with the expected date of menstruation (the 28th day of my cycle), it remains ambiguous whether ... there was ever a fertilized ovum or not. The reality of the pregnancy, both for myself’”*
“No one can say with 100-percent certainty that anything in the piece did or did not happen,” Shvarts said, adding that she does not know whether she was ever pregnant. “The nature of the piece is that it did not consist of certainties.”I can think of one certainty; within a few weeks this whole publicity stunt will be forgotten.
“…Shvarts (or somebody claiming to be Shvarts) denied the university's denial in an e-mail to msnbc.com, insisting that the acts were real.
‘I did very much impregnate myself and then induce the miscarriages,’ read the e-mail from her personal account that was sent late Thursday.
That was the only response from Shvarts, whose campus phone has been disconnected and who didn't return e-mails to her school account. When msnbc.com forwarded the e-mail to Yale officials, who forwarded it to Shvarts, Shvarts told them she didn't write the e-mail.
But then she echoed similar sentiments in the school paper, but slightly changed her story, saying she didn't know if she had actually been pregnant, but that she had inseminated herself and later induced bleeding.
University officials said Shvarts told them she would deny their version of events.
‘Her denial is part of her performance,’ Klasky said. ‘We are disappointed that she would deliberately lie to the press in the name of art.’
The project was approved by a faculty adviser in the Yale School of Art, Klasky said, adding that the proposal did not include details.
It’s still not clear what Shvarts actually did — or why.
The e-mail to msnbc.com from Shvarts' account stated the project was designed to illuminate a fundamental aspect of ‘Womynhood.’
‘I take absolutely nothing more seriously than birth because creating life is the sole domain of Womyn,’ the e-mail went on. ‘But I feel that birth and death are inextricably linked and recognizing this link is key to understanding the greater purpose of my piece.’
Shvarts apparently recorded the forced miscarriages on video and planned to exhibit the images on a large cube suspended from the ceiling of a gallery in Yale’s Holcombe T. Green Jr. Hall. She also planned to include hundreds of feet of plastic sheeting layered with blood from the purported miscarriages mixed with petroleum jelly.
Ambiguity was the point, she told the student paper.
‘No one can say with 100 percent certainty that anything in the piece did or did not happen,’ she said. ‘The nature of the piece is that it did not consist of certainties. ‘
The editor of the student paper, Andrew Mangino, said Friday he stands by his story, though he notes that it’s possible Shvarts was never pregnant.
‘The News’ reporting indicates that Aliza’s project is not a hoax,’ Mangino said. ‘Two News reporters demanded and received physical evidence as well as graphic (and, at times, bloody) photographs in order to confirm that the project indeed has a physical manifestation beyond the shock value of its public explanation.’
Mangino said he doesn’t believe the paper was duped, and he rejected the idea that the paper could have been cooperating in Shvarts’ performance.
‘The News absolutely did not collude with Ms. Shvarts in any giant media hoax,’ he said. ‘Any suggestion to that effect is ludicrous and flatly wrong.’
…Whether the student paper that started the story was a victim of a ruse or helped perpetuate one, the young journalists violated basic ethical principles, said Art Caplan, director of the Center for Bioethics at the University of Pennsylvania and an msnbc.com columnist.
‘There are some topics that just cry out for verification,’ Caplan said. ‘There’s a lot of punking going on by performance artists and journalists need to be wary and savvy — even student journalists.’
That can be difficult, even for veteran journalists, [Kelly] McBride [an ethics columnist for the Poynter Institute] added.
‘We are no longer the gatekeepers of information,’ she said. ‘We have to act as if we're providing perspective where truth is elusive.’”*
The famous torture photographs from Abu Ghraib are not photographs of inmates being tortured. They were deliberately created by the guards, whose reasons for posing the pictures were complex, layered, weird, and in some unexpected cases even admirable. Morris reinterprets the infamous pictures as a kind of highly sexualized samizdat parody of the bizarre and even more terrifying reality inside and outside the prison's walls. He also suggests that some of the photos were taken on purpose to expose abuses but wound up landing the photographers in jail. It is one of the outstanding ironies of Morris' story that the photographs, which were seen by the world as documentary evidence of torture, were used as a way to distract attention from the brutal crimes that took place off-camera. While the low-ranking soldiers caught in the staged pictures went to prison, the teams of professional Army and CIA interrogators who actually tortured and murdered prisoners inside Abu Ghraib were never identified or punished.
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posted by illiad at 8:45 AM on April 17, 2008