New Website!

I’m excited to announce my updated website, featuring recent work. I will still continue to post works in progress here.

www.brigidmcauliffe.com

[Re]turning

Re[turning] is live cinema performance about the significance of the Tango to a community in Rosario, Argentina. I became interested in the Tango during my first weekend in Rosario, living in a historic Tango venue. As I watched the dancers through the steamy glass of a rooftop window, the fog condensing from the cold air outside and heat of the dancers inside, I became entranced. This project seeks to capture the aesthetic beauty of the Tango while also speaking to its historical and cultural dimensions. As a foreigner, my images convey the gaze and wonderment of a distant observer. They reflect movement, memory, longing, and the increased symbiosis of bodies in motion—all viewed from a lens none too clear.

The dancers describe why Tango is important to them. Many of them talk about how it’s part of their identity, both personally and culturally. They describe the feelings one experiences while dancing and the emotions of the music, reflecting “all of life in three minutes (the standard length of a Tango).” An older woman talks of how she danced every night with her husband when he was still alive and how her whole family dances. “It’s part of our identity,” she says. A young woman eloquently traces how the Tango reflects politics as well, explaining how Tango had to go underground and was almost lost during the seventies and eighties when Argentina was in political turmoil. “People didn’t think of having fun, or feel safe going out. Fortunately the major Tango artists kept it going and today the tradition carries on.”

Using VDMX, a live mixing software typically used by VJ’s, we (David Fodel and I) created a ten minute performance piece combining my footage of the dancers and the interviews with live writing and music. As the interview clips came up on the screen, I translated and reacted spontaneously to what each participant expresses in various clips while Dave mixed the layers. The performance culminated in our own version of Volver, a famous Tango song that embodies the memory and longing Tango is known for. In my first version of this project, a musician I interview spontaneously sings this song in front of my camera. David and I start this song with an electronic midi track, transitioning into me playing this song on my accordion. Throughout the piece we highlight the combination of old and new evident in the Tango. We do this mostly through sound by mixing in static and also mixing old and new instrumentation in our version of Volver. The combination of images, also touch on this concept. Some are grainy and foggy, mimicking history and memory, while others are clear and fluid, feeling more contemporary. The people being interviewed also speak about the juxtaposition of old and new, as they discuss the significance of the Tango, both personally and culturally. We titled this piece [Re]turning, an English translation of Volver, that expresses the physical turning of the Tango, as well as the psychological return.

Lift and Angle – Installation @ Denver International Airport

Final Statement:

My work reflects population movement and changing notions of home idealized in a simple geometric shape: the cube. From box-framed houses to the box shaped cubicles we work in, this transcendent shape signifies the spaces where most people spend their time. Thirty vellum boxes represent population growth and movement across the United States over the past decade. From left to right, each column of five boxes represents data from the US Census Bureau indicating growth over the past decade for California, Texas, Colorado, Illinois, Florida and New York. Population change is reflected in lines of thread. Simple, abstract flight patterns over each region are printed on the back of each box. The fabric backdrop is inspired by the flight patterns of the entire United States. To further represent transition and migration, I suspend the boxes as if in flight.

More info: http://www.co-lab.info/noplacelikehome

Work/Models In Progress

Photoshop mockups with slight variations in form…

Boxes in progress…

Everything Absent Or Distorted

Dirty Plates

Your Secret Here.

Your Secret Here is a commentary on the confidential nature of coded and encrypted communication and the growing concern for privacy and protecting our identities. This age of electronic information has created a fear of public exposure of private life, thus building distance, dishonesty and secrets amongst people. Your Secret Here urges the viewer to participate through writing or speaking their secrets in a confessional booth. A conflicting tension is created by both the fear and the desire of being exposed. With the popular use of online social networking venues, such as Facebook, MySpace and Blogspot, private lives are willingly exposed. As the viewer participates, this tension is addressed and exploited. The spoken secrets will be aurally shredded through audio manipulation. The written secrets can either be posted on the gallery wall, or shredded and dispersed. We urge the viewers to participate in a cathartic ritual with their shredded secrets. The viewers are invited to walk around the space, dispersing their secrets along with others. As the carefully arranged floor design is eventually swept away, so are the secrets.

Here are some photos of the floor in progess…

Adam Butler took this last photo of the floor queens.

Photos from the Installation:

LIMITLESS PROPOSAL

My ultimate work of installation art will include the following:

I will organize a team of international artists and documentarians to create an intercultural collaboration. The majority will be Argentines, considering the project revolves around the Argentine culture and it will be shown at the MALBA. However, including artists of various nationalities will be important to offer different perspectives.

There will be three huge projections on the building of the MALBA (Museo de Arte Latinoamericano de Buenos Aires). I am choosing the MALBA because this project fits their mission. “Our main objectives are: to educate the public, and to stimulate public interest in Latin American artists; to contribute to awareness of Latin America’s cultural achievements, encourage appreciation of regional cultural and artistic diversity; collaborating to these ends with the national and international community, promote artistic exchange between national, regional, and international institutions, and support innovative programs that focus on the visual arts and Latin American culture.” http://www.malba.org.ar

Live narratives of the Argentinean culture, history, identity and memory will be told through stories of the Tango. The voices will be amplified. We will have an open call for participants, where they will submit their stories to the selection committee. In addition we will recruit certain people we discover through research or friendship.

We will be utilizing the unique construction of the MALBA. It has three large, angled surfaces that are made up of many large tiles. The images will be projected onto these tiles, eventually covering every tile. The video will be interactive, using patches created in Jitter or Pure Data. There will be certain conceptual words such as “memory” and “identity” which will trigger the images.

After all the tiles are filled, there will be a moment of silence where the projections  change to a black slate. An interactive performance will finish the piece. A Tango orchestra (Orchéstra Típica) will play and dancers will perform in front of the building. The dancers will be simultaneously projected upon the building and the images will be manipulated through another Jitter or Pure Data patch. This patch will manipulate the images depending on the dynamics of the music.

Influences:

My main influences are Krystof Wodiczko and Janet Cardiff. Wodiczko usually works with large scale, socially conscience projection projects. He often projects large images onto historically or culturally loaded public structures while also adding narratives that reflect or inspire the imagery. Janet Cardiff changes spaces through audio narratives, playing with ideas of memory, history, truth and fiction. Both artists push the boundaries of installation art by transforming spaces outside. They are working to transform exteriors rather than interiors.

You can view an animated sequence at the link below:

Untitled from brigid mcauliffe on Vimeo.

Volver Documentation

Some photos from one of the two shows in el Levante…

Open Studio (Statement and Flyers)

Brigid McAuliffe
Colorado (EEUU), 1979

Brigid McAuliffe nació en Wisconsin. En el año 2001 recibió su licenciatura en bellas artes (BFA) por Colorado State University donde se especializó en fotografía y ceramica. En la actualidad esta estudiando media electronica por University of Denver, con un especialidad en video. También ella toca musica (voz, accordión) y aprecia que video puede combinar imágenes y sonido. Sus intereses artísticos están en ambos. Además se interese en el trabajo documental y a menudo integra entrevistas o narrativas personales en su trabajo. Ella se esfuerza por utilizar medios como formas de la expresión y vehículos para historias que exploran la identidad cultural, la memoria y otros asuntos sociales. Ella será un instructor en la Universidad de Denver el año proximo y se graduará con un Maestros de bellas artes (MFA) en mayo. Después, ella espera continuar la enseñanza, la arte, y la musica.

Durante su residencia, Brigid McAuliffe absorbió los varios sonidos y las vistas de Rosario. Por lo tanto, ella trabaja actualmente en múltiples proyectos. Esta exposición consiste en fotografías y video del Tango en el Levante. Esto es un proyecto sitio-específico que utiliza el espacio extraordinario del Levante para captar a las bailarinas en una nueva manera, y para exhibir el trabajo en el mismo espacio. Las imágenes servirán como un simulacro de los caracteres verdaderos y espaciarán, así como el Tango sirve como simulacros para memorias y emociones. Ella llegó a ser interesada en el Tango en su primer fin de semana en Rosario. Mirando por una ventana húmeda en el techo del Levante, la niebla condensada del aire frío fuera de y el sudor que viene de las bailarinas adentro, ella estuvo embelesado. Su proyecto procura captar la belleza estética del Tango mientras también hablando con sus dimensiones históricas y culturales. Cuando un extranjero, sus imágenes transmiten la mirada y la admiración de un observador lejano. Ellos reflejan el movimiento, la memoria, el anhelo, y la simbiosis aumentada de cuerpos en el movimiento—todo visto de un lente nebuloso.

Brigid McAuliffe was born in Wisconsin and grew up in Colorado. In 2001 she earned her BFA from Colorado State University, where she specialized in Photography and Cermamics. Currently she is working towards her MFA in Electronic Media Art at the University of Denver, specializing in video. Brigid also plays accordion and sings. She appreciates how video allows her to combine images and sound, as her artistic interests are in both audio and visual realms. She is also interested in documentary work and often incorporates interviews or personal narratives into her work. She strives to use media as forms of expression and vehicles for stories that explore cultural identity, memory and other social issues. She will be an instructor at the University of Denver in the fall and will graduate with a Masters of Fine Arts in May. Afterwards, she hopes to continue teaching, making art, and playing music.

During her residency, Brigid McAuliffe absorbed the sounds and sights of Rosario. It was difficult to decide on a single project because she found many parts of her new community to be fascinating. This show consists of photographs and video of the Tango in el Levante. This is a site-specific project that uses the unique space of el Levante to capture the dancers in a new way, and to exhibit the work in the same space. The images will serve as a simulacrum of the real characters and space, just as the Tango serves as simulacra for memories and emotions. She became interested in the Tango on her first weekend in Rosario. Staring through a steamy glass window in the roof of el Levante, the fog condensed from the cold air outside and the sweat coming from the dancers inside, Brigid was entranced. Her project seeks to capture the aesthetic beauty of the Tango while also speaking to its historical and cultural dimensions. As a foreigner, her images convey the gaze and wonderment of a distant observer. They reflect movement, memory, longing, and the increased symbiosis of bodies in motion—all viewed from a lens none too clear.

These are Alain and I’s flyers. I helped Alain created a CD with his poems read in three languages. He paid special attention to voices, and chose them carefully. He chose Diana, our Spanish teacher to read in Spanish. He read in French and he chose Bryce to read in English, basing his decision off of Bryce’s singing voice. We then added some of my field recordings from sounds around el Levante that had become familiar and nostalgic to us. For example we included the horn from our favorite street vendor that would pass by everyday and we included audio from the Tango downstairs, which we could hear and record from our rooms upstairs. Alain has secured some funding to make a beautiful CD case. He has requested to use some of my photographs. I knew which images he would choose (I guess we know eachother pretty well after living in the same space for two months!). He chose some of the darkest imagery I have ever created, which fits very well with the mood of his poetry. Alain is an incredible poet and I’m very excited to collaborate with him!