HONK IF YOU LOVE JESUS...TEXT WHILE DRIVING IF YOU WANT TO MEET HIM

Downtown St. Petersburg, FL

Outside the St. Pete Museum of Fine Arts on Beach Drive

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Outside the USF St. Pete parking garage/Barnes & Noble

Outside Residence Hall One

Outside Cassis-American Brasserie

Entrance to the St. Pete Pier

man who liked the "message"

People outside the church didn't look too happy about this one.

Which Me Do You See?

For those easily offended, this project is probably not for you. 

Since I was very young, dancing and theatre has been a passion of mine. People who are familiar with the performing arts community know that there's no room for intolerance or homophobia. Everyone dances and performs together, and uniqueness is embraced. 

Stepping outside this community, I realized how unaware and unaccustomed everyone else around me was to this world. While I had become comfortable with boys kissing boys and girls kissing girls, others still felt extremely uncomfortable around it and thought it to be a strange sight. 

This short video featuring my friends Patrick Justin and Alec Leddy, two incredible male dancers at University of Tampa, is to intentionally cause the discomfort my less accustomed peers feel when confronted with homosexuality. It's also a kind of character study using a Patrick to illustrate a boy who understands the conventional views of love but chooses the "me" that he sees, not the one you might see on the outside. 

On a strictly dance level, I also used this project as a way to experiment with seeing the difference of a man partnering a girl and the same man being partnered by another man. 

 

PS One of the installations that the boys are dancing on might also offend, but I found it to be a wonderful coincidence that it was installed in Curtis Hixon Park around the time I wanted to shoot there!

(before they were all removed..!) 

Assignment #1-An Intervention

My idea for an intervention into space stemmed from my love of nature and the upsetting amounts of garbage I encounter on Florida's beautiful beaches. I thought that filling a designated amount of sand with beer bottles and soda cans filled with filthy water, cigarette butts and small bits of trash would get my point across. In choosing one of the beach volleyball courts outside the UT gym, students passing by or attempting to use the court would see how disgusting the littered sand looks. Also leaving the court beside it unadulterated would prove to be a moving juxtaposition, hopefully making the viewer pause and think that a clean beach is a better beach for everyone. 


What kind of media would be best to relay your project to the class? Video/audio files/still photography/text, etc. Feel free to use a number of these media.


The best way to relay my project to the class would be through pictures of my installation (of the installation itself and the reactions of the people encountering it.) Possibly video of the people seeing it and/or of the maintenance people reacting to cleaning it up. 

How does your work relate to the place that you are working?


My work will directly relate to the place I'm working in--the bottles will be embedded in the environment. 

How do/did viewers engage or notice your work?


Viewers will be anyone passing by. The courts are located next to a highly traveled sidewalk cutting across campus. 


The themes you're trying to convey? 


I'm attempting to convey a sense of disgust for littering by intentionally littering an area. Seeing a clean beach and saying "don't litter" is one thing, seeing a filthy beach and saying it is another. I think the impact will be greater by visually seeing the dirty sand. 

original photograph found on etsy.com