Artist Statement
What are the qualifications required
to be considered a monster? Do you have
to have fangs or claws, or do you just need to be hateful? I chose to share my belief that the only
monsters in this world are human beings.
Granted, not all humans are monsters.
But everyone does something “monsterish” at some point in his or her
life. Whether it is a hateful comment,
physical or emotional abuse, or even murder, no one is innocent of hate.
I
wanted to point out the dangers of abuse through my performance and video. Abuse can lead to self-harm, depression, and
emotional instability. I had a friend
that was raped at a young age which led to many of the aforementioned
things. This person had such low self-esteem
and self-worth. It was hard for me to see
this individual in such a hard place. I
have often been told that I am too skinny.
While that doesn’t bother me all that much, there are still insecurities
that come with it. It’s been a difficult
road to learn to accept myself as I am and to become comfortable in my own
skin. I don’t consider myself to be abused,
but caution must always be used when critiquing someone so that it is
constructive instead of destructive.
In
class, I cited the author Rick Yancey as one of my inspirations for this
assignment. I used a quote from his
novel, The Final Descent, in my video
portion for this assignment. In another
of his novels, The Isle of Blood,
Yancey’s characters chase after the king of all monsters. On the way, however, they discover a much
bigger monster: man. People cause the
most pain to other people and are pretty much the only living things that maliciously
or sadistically hurt other living things.
I really don’t want this performance or this artist statement to be
taken as bashing on the human race, or that I have no faith in my fellow men;
all I want to say is that there are more important things to worry about than
the imaginary monster under the bed. We
teach children to avoid and even fear things that are evil, but a lot of evil
comes under the disguise of something good.
In
conclusion, I do believe in monsters…just not the traditional kind. Abuse (including self-degradation) in any
form is harmful and dangerous. It
shouldn’t be ignored. We need to lift
each other up, and we need to teach our children to be good and kind to others. Kindness and respect are the silver bullets
that we have available to us to kill the monstrous hate that exists in our
world.
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