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Imagemaker: The Hand is the Lens

Presenter: Joan Truckenbrod

Saturday, October 21 - 9:00AM to 9:25AM
LiNC 314

The hand becomes the lens as photographic or video imagery is infused into an object. This juxtaposition injects the meaning of each into the other, as we layer experiences. African artwork embodies this - "the hand - source of action and instrument of creativity - is the vehicle that transforms the ineffable, invisible abstractions of through into objects of tangible, material reality to be...contemplated, narrated and performed," as Mary Nooter Roberts discusses in her book The Shape of Belief.


Highly charged rituals and ceremonies of indigenous cultures have instigated my combining video imagery with hand-mad objects. Descriptions of sacred symbols being painted on the nude body under the cover of darkness, to be revealed by firelight as the person dances around a fire at night. The symbols take the form of the body and are revealed and concealed as the body undulates in dance. This vision provided the inspiration for addressing issues of environmental pollution in my artwork. Injecting a physicality into the imagery created a resonance beyond the surface for me.

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