digital artists (week2)
BLOG POST 2:
For this task, I have looked into three different artists who all share similarities in their work, I decided to look at Petra Cortright, Leah Schrager and Emily Gervais.
Petra Cortright:
‘Buggin out’
Petra Cortright is an artist from LA, who works in video,
painting and digital media. Cortright is known for her work that she began
posting on YouTube around ten years ago in which she displays herself in a
playful manner, experimenting with filters and effects that are built into her
webcam camera. At the time when Cortright began posting these ‘out there’
videos of herself performing in a strange way, filters and effects were not as
enhanced or normalised as they are today with the likes of snapchat and
Instagram.
Cortright uses herself as a subject of the art in majority
of her videos, for example in an exhibition she had 50 flat screen monitors all
screening her videos in which she is seen in a yellow dress as flames erupt
from her body.
Cortright sells her work that she ‘vlogs’ on YouTube in a
very clever and unique way, she sells the work at the value of her YouTube
views. Her other works consist of paintings complexed using digital software’s
to create impressionistic elements using software’s like Photoshop along with
printing onto different materials such as linen and aluminium.
Leah Schrager
‘The Google Project’
Leah Schrager is a web artist, whom has a fascination with
digital art and incorporating the female body. The artist has a very unique
approach when it comes to her art, as she appears to have alter egos in which
she portrays in her work. Schrager is a former model who decided to use the
female body in her art as she knows it’s what people want to see. Forbes
published a piece on Schrager on her work she created in 2014 “The Naked
Therapist:
“Artist Leah
Schrager entered public discourse in rather splendid fashion when
she revealed herself to be "The Naked Therapist" in 2014. As
her former alter ego, Sarah White, provided a kind of counselling service with
a webcam girl component, in which Schrager would offer men paths to mental
health by using nudity to give them a sense of intimacy. Schrager, as White,
was interviewed everywhere from Jay Leno to Psychology Today, and when she
revealed her true identity she had already, in a sense, defined her conceptual
purpose that was to define her art work from then on: proliferating images of
her body through cyber space”[1]
Schrager has many different alter egos in her
work, which set her aside from other artists as her work feels like it is on a
much more personal level, using the web also to create an audience.
‘The Real Afterlife’
Emilie Gervais is a new media artist, exploring
relationships within art, internet and network culture. Gervais’ work is centred
around the 90s internet aesthetic labelling her works in a url form like “backdoortrojangirl.net”.
her feminist views project strong messages into her work, as the internet is a
place in which feminist artists can freely express themselves.
A piece of Gervais’ work that I really liked was “The Real
Afterlife” in which the url is heaven.emilygervais.com, already enticing the viewer
to click on it, as the word heaven draws them in. the link takes you to a 90s
theme flashing gif filled page, full of utopian like animated icons.
These three artists appealed to me through their quirky portrayals
of themselves through their art. As a viewer, I enjoy the digital culture
implemented into their art, creating something very personal but portraying it
in a fun, quirky, way.
[1] Lehrer,
A. (2017). Artist Leah Schrager on Sex-Positive Selfies, Instagram Fame,
and Naked Therapy. Available:
https://www.forbes.com/sites/adamlehrer/2017/04/25/artist-leah-schrager-proliferates-sex-positive-feminist-selfies-through-social-media/#ebe4bd6425ff.
Last accessed 16th Oct 2018.
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