Image Still from That's Hysterical video

The objects filmed come from my home in Central Florida: flora, fauna, and a variety of both natural and urban locations. But viewed under this lens they all speak to hysteria in some way. The woman on the screen works to soothe that hysteria. Despite the hypocrisies and ironies pointed out in the edits, the woman washes. She tries to remain calm. She strives to be comfortable in her body and her environment. Though we may get quite agitated with the stories the women on the audio recount to us, like music scores in movies and TV shows we look to the scarved woman on the screen for how to ultimately react.

The audio contains voice mail recordings of anonymous women calling my Google Voice number and responding to a prompt I sent out. In doing this I am setting up my own sample poll results, my own “yes all women” hash tag.

Through filming and editing I can direct the viewer towards a comparison of images. We are used to seeing moving images. This is a comfortable platform. The headphones have an inherent set of instructions built into them. With this set up there’s no danger of the viewer feeling anxious about “touching the art”. Through asking the viewer to compare one object in a scene to another in a familiar platform, I am asking the viewer to take another look at what is familiar. Through using a time based media I am showing the immediate and contemporary nature of the conversation.

Artwork Info

Type of Work new media
Medium digital video with Google voice mail recordings
Dimensions variable
Subject Matter documentary- style collection of images editing one scene comparing it to another

Artist Info

Lesley Silvia

Graduate Student
Joined: October 21, 2013

Rights: All Rights Reserved

Appears In 1 Album

36 items

Lesley Silvia LRVS MFA Thesis 2016