WORKING TITLE: MINNIE WEST’S POOL PARTY or THE POOL PARTY
Video still from Minnie West’s Pool Party
THE POOL PARTY is an interactive art project that uses the soft power of narratives to create a dialogue about climate change in a West Texas community, greatly affected by extreme weather and heat. The project is also relevant to millions of other communities across the US that experience extreme weather patterns firsthand.
Although Texans have seen increasingly more frequent and intense heatwaves, representatives who downplay climate change and push the oil industry continue to get elected. At the same time, the internet has exploded with Texans talking about how they use their pools to cool down at night and sharing ideas how to keep their pools cool. There seems to be a disconnect between what they are physically experiencing and the way they are voting.
Video still from THE POOL PARTY
The piece will highlight recorded conversations and internet conversations with West Texans talking about their pools, the heat, does it seem to be getting hotter,… Running simultaneously on two large monitors: vintage home movies of people swimming, while selected quotes appear over the footage. The conversations will be anonymous, giving speakers free reign to share their thoughts, and will include a variety of opinions, humor, and anecdotes from a diverse group of West Texans.
The piece contains:
*Audio: Recorded conversations: audio turns on as people approach the piece.
*Visual: 2 monitors: selected quotes scroll over vintage pool footage.
*Visual: In front of monitors, a Pepper’s Ghost reflection/illusion of children’s pool inflatables rotate and appear suspended mid-air.
*A blank notebook: viewers share thoughts.
The Pepper's Ghost Illusion of children's inflatables unconsciously imparts a sense of fragility (fragility of climate) and the illusion of safety (safety from a changing environment). The home videos from the 40s, 50s, 60s of people relaxing and swimming in their pools conveys a lost time in West Texas where people could swim in their pools in August, happily in the full sun, rather than using the pool at night for heat management.
ENVIRONMENTAL AND SOCIAL IMPACT
Part of the problem: confirmation bias and the pushback from climate change deniers who are arguing against the science, don’t like change, see it as an intrusion on their lifestyle, have a vested interest in the fossil fuel industries, see it as a Democratic agenda, or all the above.
Part of the solution: meeting people in their backyards, getting them to talk about climate through their personal experiences in a non-judgmental/apolitical manner. Importantly, the piece will include conversations from deniers talking about their heat management.
*Studies show that personal experience with extreme weather leads to greater acceptance of the existence of climate change. Using the soft power of narratives, the POOL PARTY provides a platform for shared experiences of extreme weather and self-reflection about climate change. By interviewing people in West Texas about their pools and how they use them to cool off in the evenings, they (and the rest of the country) can approach the topic of intense weather as a personal experience. There will be no back-and-forth arguments about whether climate change is real, just people talking about what it feels like, how they’re coping, and what the future might be like for their children.
West Texas is just one of millions of communities across the US that are feeling the effects of extreme heat and weather patterns. By focusing specifically on a community in West Texas, I hope to lay the groundwork for an open dialogue about acceptance and solutions.
TARGET AUDIENCE:
THE POOL PARTY is dedicated to breaking through information bias, by reaching an audience that is normally highly resistant to discussions/ reflections about changes in our environment. The anonymous voices heard in the piece reflect the shared heat experiences from West Texans: these include climate change deniers, people unwilling to engage politically, and those who view change has an infringement to their way of life. OUTREACH Strategy: to engage with the most diverse and potentially reluctant groups of people unwilling to engage in discussions about heat and heat management in West Texas: 1) Intentionally stay away from conventional art centers (galleries & art fairs) and focusing on reaching the broadest base through community centers, senior centers, churches, and grocery stores. 2) Removing any language that triggers information bias. 3) Maintaining respect for all opinions. 4) Maintaining an interactive stance that includes ALL conversations. 4) Maintaining an apolitical stance.
A main part of the project has been researching what gets people out of their confirmation bias and into a change mindset. Confirmation bias (seeking information that confirms prior beliefs) is especially difficult to breakthrough during these politically dissonant times. The US lags behind much of the world in supporting climate change mitigation with at least 1/3 of our population denying that climate change exists and that it is caused by human activity. So what can be done?
Studies show that providing scientific data does the opposite of changing opinions- it reinforces prior views, but personal experience with extreme weather leads to greater acceptance of the existence of climate change. THE POOL PARTY documents and shares those personal experiences through the prism of pools and heat management.
SHIFT MEMORY is a performative dance piece that explores the cumulative and contextual aspects of proprioceptive memory. A large portion of my work as a speech language pathologist has focused on children with sensory integration disorders. These children often seek proprioceptive input in order to feel their bodies in space. More than likely you've experienced deep pressure proprioceptive stimulation while swimming underwater.
SHIFT MEMORY engages the audience as active agents in a process that disrupts normative sensory input. Using industrial wind fans, the performers manipulate pressurized air to push voluminous sheets of parachute fabric (each 15’ high x 30’ long) into continually shape-shifting walls, caverns, and tunnels. The audience/ participants push against/resist/ move with the pressurized air through the shifting, voluminous shapes that guide them through continuously dividing and expanding cavernous spaces. The participants come away from the performance with a heightened sense of proprioceptive input and a greater perception/understanding of their bodies moving through space.
(in the works)
An ongoing and ever expanding film consisting of film clips of images of women taken from films dating from 1888 (Roundhay Garden Scene) to the present.