Preferred Name
Jennifer M. Tremblay
Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 4.0 License.
Date of Graduation
Spring 2015
Document Type
Thesis
Degree Name
Master of Fine Arts (MFA)
Department
School of Art, Design and Art History
Advisor(s)
Corinne Diop
Abstract
The focus of this paper is on a body of work created between 2014 and 2015. This series, titled Immersion, deals with the pollution of a local body of water, Blacks Run, and with my own bodily illnesses that occurred during this time period. Using large-scale cyanotypes, video, and large format photography I explore the attitudes that lead to environmental pollution and reference my own struggle with depression and anxiety.
My work examines traditional gendered views of the landscape and female figure, and the intersections and interactions between these two ‘bodies’. By using my illness as a way to connect with the illness of the stream, and using the stream as a metaphor for my illness, I allow a different conversation between the female body and the feminized landscape to take place. My current work also challenges historical tropes in photography, such as an assumed distance between the photographer and subject and the concept of the straight print. By directly using the polluted water of the stream to destroy the surface of the negatives and to develop my cyanotypes, I remove distance, record pollution in an evocative manner, and allow for a non-hierarchical approach that gives the stream an active role in the process of creation.
Recommended Citation
Tremblay, Jennifer M., "Immersion" (2015). Masters Theses, 2010-2019. 18.
https://commons.lib.jmu.edu/master201019/18
