Project 4 - Exquisite Corpse

Partners

Gretchen Steinbrunner

Salil Parekh

Design Process

My process began with an historical artistic exploration of the body. My favorite art movements were the ones that began to destroy and rebuilid form, often with the body at the center of the artistic exploration. I looked at famous works involving the human body within a variety of artistic movements, from Cubism to Fauvsim to Dada. I came across one painting by one of my favorite artists, Kazimir Malevich, who helped begin the Russian Suprematist art movement in the beginning of the 20th century. The piece is called Suprematism Contour of Sportsmen, painted in 1928 (see below).

My background story was simple and based off the suprematist movement that Malevich founded - a spiritually pure being represented as a human. Here was my sketch and representation of the painting:

My partner, Gretchen Steinbrunner, has a background in performance and design. She came up with the following sketch: The sketch, according to Gretchen, is an anonymous figure after impact. I found the implied movement in the sketch to be particularly interesting.
My other partner, Salil, came up with sketch to represent a figure from ancient Indian mythology, Narkasur. Narkasur was an evil demon who used to rule the land of Goa in southwestern India. Lord Krishna defeated Narkasur, and the defeat of Narkasur is a reminder that good can beat out evil:

I was tasked with the head of the spiritual being, the torso of the body in motion, and the legs and hips of the Narkasur sketch.

New Background Story

I formed my new background story in relation to the location of each piece of the body.

• The head represents a spiritual pure being, and so the mind is pure and enlightened.
• The torso is an anonymous figure after impact. The torso contains the gut and heart, two organs that facilitate feeling and love.
• The legs and feet are from Narkasur. The legs and feet ground the rest of the body, and form base of the rest of the body.

My new background story is a story of an evil deity that found enlightenment through impact. Based off the Narkasur story, this being also was an arrogant and evil overseer of another beach town, however instead of Goa, this being oversaw Rockaway Beach. This evil deity, known as Rocka, would kidnap partygoers and surfers escaping from New York City. Rocka, who often would kidnap these surfers to claim the waves, was causing major harm to the state of New York. Mayor de Blasio and civilians prayed to the higher powers to get rid of Rocka. One night, on a particularly high tide, Rocka went for a surf on the largest wave that has ever hit Rockaway Beach. Rocka was paddling, and upon standing up, a shark jumped out in front of Rocka, causing Rocka to lose balance and wipe out hard into the wave. Rocka blacked out, lost consciousness, and woke up on the beach without any inch of evil in the soul. Rocka was then enlightened and kind-hearted after this wipeout. Rocka welcomes everyone to Rockaway Beach, and now oversees the well-being of partygoers and surfers from New York City.

Reflections

I thought this was the most fun project yet. The collaboration aspect of this assignment was the best part; our group met several times to discuss each other's sketches. It is pretty incredible how seamlessly each of our ideas fit together. I thought the most rewarding part of the project was seeing the completed product, as well as our partners'.