2027 SPE Annual Conference: Community in Contrast
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print this pageLaugh It's Funny
Student Panel
Friday, October 23 - 3:30PM to 4:20PM
WCAD 101
Laugh: It's Funny. is a panel discussion led by Dillon Bryant, Keeley Morgan, and Drew Nikonowicz exploring the absurdity and humor of loss within the expanded field of photography. Humor—as foundation, as access, and as resilience—counteracts the ubiquity of loss. Absurdity and commitment to the bit create the space and distance necessary to mourn. There is a banality to grief that hinges on absurdity, and we feel the only appropriate response is to laugh.
This presentation takes the form of an experimental performance lecture, navigating individual instances of levity in our work and looking at how specificity can build community. A paper airplane that secretly flies itself, a bouquet of black-eyed susans, prickly pears and penises, and an urn made of Double Bubble chewing gum. These objects were made through shared invitations and actions of participation. No one person could possibly chew that much gum. None of these can be done alone. Our objects and processes create the distance for grieving to occur.
Grieving is not an inherently negative act. It is a shared action. Our work attempts to give it a form and a name. We utilize object making, performance, installation, time-based media, video games, photomontage and collage, the archive, and text to process grief and trauma. Across this expanded field, humor is a consistent theme. The weaving of our practices in this lecture performance mimics the real experience of grieving communally.
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