Jenny, your extraordinary range of research processes and courageous experiments have coalesced into an exciting and dynamic project outcome and practice. At times you create works almost accidentally to the periphery of your intended works; the panel encourages you to not discount the works you might do for fun or as an experiment. The singing lesson for dogs, for example, is particularly resolved as an artwork in itself, even though it may have felt simple to produce. Your more complex works are a testament to the rites of passage you have been through this year. You have pushed yourself in learning or showcasing new skills - singing, digital technologies, healing practices, text - and your developing awareness of how audio works with an image is becoming really strong. You should follow this and develop it further. The audio in your works is proving to be a really powerful component in creating an experience for the viewer and assisting a kind of visceral encounter with and access point for this difficult terrain of your subject matter. Congratulations on a brave and adventurous year.
Project Title: To Build A Brain
MARK RECEIVED WAS 65/80
1950s Scientifically Endorsed Parental Advice Video (from Trial Presentation)
Woman with 'sleep hysteria' in straight jacket
Swaddled baby
eyes through windows
To see, to hear, to touch, to taste, to feel, to laugh and to love.
eyes through windows
Be kind to your body and your body will be kind to you and those you love, including the earth
Sensory healing, sensorial body, sensational care.
I got down to making an animated video about the Polyvagal Theory. In Ventral Vagal Mode (balance or safety) I wrote & sang a song for the narrative component. Researchers Porges, Doidge and Damasio made me aware that my indigestion, irritable bowel, pain issues may be related to my emotional life. Somatic therapies supported my closer attention to my body body bo, this self-reflexive approach led to self-awareness & healing. A potential of neuroscience is for self-healing through self-knowing.
eyes through windows
It is disheartening to learn that abuse and trauma impact the development of people's brains, however, remember that healing changes our brains too.
'We look at the world once in childhood. The rest is memory'. Winner 2020 Nobel Prize in Literature
Building a Brain became Building MY Brain. Brains are mysterious, neuroplasticity has supported new knowledge but my Brain today won't be my Brain tomorrow: Brains change.Years of talking therapy built my confidence, self-esteem & authenticity. Building MY Brain led to sensory therapies, singing, Body Bonding & knowledge, emotions experienced in the body become feelings like fear, anxiety in the Brain.Moving to Gisborne worked; Mother's voice is a notable absence from my Built Brain: Self.
Jennifer, well done on a significant journey of healing, self-reflection and artistic learning and deepening of your praxis. This is a rich and complex area of praxis which holds great meaning and benefit for the broader artistic and mental health community, and there appears to be sensitivity and openness on your part to keep learning and exploring your subjective and embodied relationship to these areas. This feels like a generative area of practice-led research. Well done.
Mark Received was 80/100 an High Distinction