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Master Of Fine Arts Thesis

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Master Of Fine Arts Thesis

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Master of Fine Arts Thesis
by
Kathleen Johnson
A Thesis Presented to the
FACULTY OF THE GRADUATE SCHOOL
UNIVERSITY OF SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA
In Partial Fulfillment of the
Requirements for the Degree
MASTER OF FINE ARTS
August 1995
Copyright 1995 Kathleen Johnson
UMI Number: 1378417
UMI Microform 1378417
Copyright 1996, by UMI Company. AH rights reserved.
This microform edition is protected against unauthorized
copying under Title 17, United States Code.
UMI
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UNIVERSITY O F SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA
TH E GRADUATE SCHOOL
UNIVER SITY PARK
LOS ANGELES, CALIFO RNIA 0 0 0 0 7
This thesis, written by
under the direction of h'SSl—.Thesis Committee,
and approved by all its members, has been pre
sented to and accepted by the Dean of The
Graduate School, in partial fulfillm ent of the
requirements for the degree of
Dtan
THESIS COMMITTEE
Chairman
Table of Contents
Body of the Paper................................................................................................................... 1
Appendix 1..............................................................................................................................12
1
It is a sort of universe in expansion for which no limits could be fixed and
which, for all that, would not be incoherence." (from Luce Irigaray,
The Sex That Is Not O ne, used by Tania Modleski to describe soap
opera as a form. )1
Hindsight is a fabulous distancing device. What I only wondered about some
time ago, now appears more readily explainable. There is a clarity that I
suspect can only be achieved with the passage of time. Even if the new ways in
which I’m now explaining my work to myself are merely constructions, just as
the explanations that I provided for myself at the time of making the work were
constructions, this current interpretation can, at least, make the claim of history,
and can therefore be associated with a more tested understanding.
There were four main parts of my thesis installation^ - Everlasting Love. Color
Attempt #1 -42 from Baseballs’ Been Good To Me, Hot Set from Baseball’ s
Been Good To M e , Four Stories from Baseballs' Been Good To Me, and
Mousehead. All three objects but especially the first two are related to the
fiction stories. The stories from ''Baseball's Been Good To M e” describe four
situations: an encounter with an alien who describes a process and aesthetic
that is related to baseball; an accident at a baseball game that inspired the
production of artwork; a romantic memory of a visiting dervish who was
accused of magically altering the outcome of a baseball game; and finally, a
sexual encounter with a school of fish.3 The stories are a group of four that
go together as one piece, one effort. The stories all describe, for the most part,
1 Home is Where the Heart Is.Tania Modleski, p. 105.
2 Our 1995 MFA Thesis Exhibition wan held in space B5 at Bergamot Station, Santa Monica from
April 29- May 13, 1995.
3 See Appendix 1
missed opportunities. These opportunities need to be just out of reach in 2
order to anticipate and preview a future where the next attempt, which lies just
around the corner, might be more successful. Just as the accumulation of
objects can propose an irresoluteness, which I will describe shortly, so do these
stories offer the as yet unfulfilled, but future possibility of completion. Most of the
effort in the stories is devoted to describing not the pleasure of actual events but
the memory of these events, not the acts of fulfillment and satisfaction but rather,
the recalling and wishing for fulfillment and completion. They describe an
irresoluteness, a fragmentation, and a stayed, steadied, and purposeful futility-
an attempt to maintain a constant anticipation. It is a lingering over what has
been and the promise of more to come, yet never the completed, present acts
themselves. It is a never ending lead up or intro, a preparation that never really
goes anywhere- a single, frozen bar of a climactic movie score which is arrested
in anticipation and foreshadowing, never progressing toward the final event, the
crash or slash or surprise ending.
Everlasting Love. Color Attempts 1-42” is a large bank of forty-two photos,
four feet wide and fifteen feet tall. Each photo is eight by ten inches and is some
shade or variation of fluorescent pink or orange. To the right of the panel is a
small placement key or guide with the photos numbered accordingly and a
second key with text that gives a brief description of each photo, each attempt.
The photos are evidence, in this case quite literally documentation, of several
attempts at perfection, of perfecting a memory. My lasting memories of the
foreigner in the first story have driven me, as a means of recapturing his
presence, to try to perfect the aesthetic units that he described to me and the
photos are the documentation of those attempts. The text key assesses the
attempts and explains the problems or inadequacies of each. For each photo,
there is a description of how that shot was successful or where it fell short or
went wrong. The effort seems impossible because there is not a single photo 3
that has completely captured the aesthetic, none that is without problems
according to the text key. It appears that his descriptions will never be
completely recaptured. As a whole, the bank of photos looks almost like a
painting or a surface divided into small sections like a bright reptile skin.
The mirror platform, entitled Hot S e t, is a stage set or an arena where the
baseballs, which are no longer really baseballs, are displayed. The platform is
three feet by three feet and is two feet high. It is covered with one foot square
mirror tile and is on wheels. The baseballs are strewn across it, with a few
spilling onto the floor. It is just finely enough made to look like art or a real life
store display but its general tone and proportions are not so slick that you
wouldn’t question its sincerity. It is not quite sure if it should take itself seriously.
This relates to the tone of the stories- neither serious, nor absurd, etc. It has
glamour, yes, but it is silly and its glamour is provisional on whether or not you
take it seriously. It is more recognizable, perhaps the most recognizable and
nameable of all of the objects, but it is nevertheless strange and perhaps out of
place. The baseballs sit atop the mirror tile and their facets are reflected in the
surface. Each baseball is covered with the same pink and orange square
sections made out of the plastic flagging tape that we see in the photos.
Although the color of the photos is duller and darker than the color of the tape
on the baseballs, one can still make a connection between the units depicted in
the photos and the tape ball squares covering the baseballs. The stitching or
‘teeth’ of the baseballs are visible through the tape ball facets and the baseballs
therefore remain somewhat recognizable. The baseballs, however, have been
altered from their original essence-unnamed or de-named. They aren’t
baseballs anymore, they are fragmented- one step further from culture,
language, and the Symbolic* -further from what is known and familiar and 4
into the realm of the pleasure of fragmentation- the realm of desire.
In the construction of the baseballs, I have performed the operation of
fragmentation and the viewer shares in this exercise of desire as he/she
experiences the work. The evidence of this pleasurable exercise is left to be
witnessed and the viewer must therefore do a similar kind of work in order to
read or participate in the piece. The mirror platform quite literally multiplies the
effect of the baseballs and furthers this fragmentation, this retreat from culture.
While the platform does display the baseballs in a familiar way and therefore
refers back toward a more cultural context of consumer display, etc., it does not
overwhelm the de-naming, fragmenting operation that occurs within the
baseball themselves.
The Mouse Head is two things at once. It is a large, recognizable cultural
symbol as well as more evidence of a herculean effort at perfection and
refinement. Originally, it was my flat footed attempt at making a large amount of
snowflakes that are alike in the face of the adage, “No two snowflakes are
alike," it became, when taken in its entirety, a recognizable image. The
Mousehead has become a very interesting piece for me. It was not created to
have as direct a link to the Baseball’s Been Good To Me project as the other
three objects in the installation, yet it seemed to have a more organic
connection to the other pieces and to my process in general. The other
elements of the installation- the stories, the bank of photos and the baseballs-
had been constructed to have an a priori connection to one another, a
preordained position in a conceptual web that had been conceived and
decided upon even before the objects were actually made. The Mousehead.
however, was connected to the effort in a different way. It was connected in
4 Ecrits. Jacques Lacan, pgs. 65-67 and pgs.196-199.
spite of itself, you might say. In working so diligently on the overall 5
conceptual framework of the installation and thereby guaranteeing for myself
the intelligibility of the project and neat fit of the parts into the framework, I
ignored other things that were happening. Not only was the Mousehead
relating to the other pieces from outside of the conceptual framework of
“Baseball’s Been Good To Me"- this framework being the stories and how the
objects were manifestations of attempts to settle the desire or longing
experienced in the stories- but I realized that all of the objects had a
psychological connection to one another that could not be wholly inscribed
within the Baseball's Been Good To Me ethos. These other ways in which
each thing, each effort was related to the other, is something that I’m still
thinking about. The Borofsky model that was suggested at the final meeting of
my these committee has been helpful in this regard. Rather than using models
such as the center and the inside/outside opposition that I used to think about,
I’m now thinking in terms of accumulation. In Borofsky’s work there is an
accumulation of things, the lining up and naming of individual pieces and efforts
(a note, a dream, a drawing, an image). Any connections, guiding principal or
psychological motivation have to be analyzed in terms of this accumulation,
taken as a whole. Ironically, however, the whole is never complete because
there is always the potential for more to be added. It spreads horizontally to
infinity. The overall perspective that the viewer desires in order to discern
structure, the system or the criteria for the accumulation, is impossible. How do
we know, for example, when we look at Borofsky’s stack of counting on sheets
of paper that he has stopped counting? We can't know that. There is always a
sense that something might be left out, that this might not be the end. I now
think that this is closer to how the four objects of my installation relate to each
other. It is still possible to claim that they relate to the overall conceptual
framework that I established with the Baseballs Been Good To Me stories, 6
but this framework cannot account for everything. Why, for example, is the
Mousehead so compelling? Why is the way in which Mousehead relates to the
other objects more interesting than the ways in which the other objects to relate
to one another? Is it just because the other three objects’ relationship was
proscribed and predetermined by the framework of the piece- does that make
them less interesting? I don’t have the answer, but a least I am now asking the
proper question.
I had assumed that the framework of Baseball’ s..." did several things. I
supposed that this model could accommodate itself to any topic, any material
and never argue back because it already assumes that there is no end site, no
goal or objective to measure up to or answer too. All bits and pieces would be
welcome
and none were ever in danger of being out of place. It is because of this
flexibility, this generosity of spirit, that the model appealed to me in the first
place. What happened in actually was, of course, different. Not all connections
between objects could be encapsulated by this model, this construction that I
made for myself in which the constituent parts could take up residence. One
pertinent way in which objects can relate to each other is described by Howard
Singerman in “Professing Postmodernism: The Visiting Artist and the Model.”
The limitless expansion that Modleski describes in the quote from page one,
this never ending effort that produces the serial form of soap opera, is related to
what Singerman refers to as a postmodern practice in general, particularly as it
is experienced in the university. Singerman describes a postmodern artistic
practice, born and nurtured in the contemporary academy, that promotes this
process of never ending seriality. What Singerman calls seriality I relate to the
idea of accumulation. He describes a situation in which discourse has
become the essential aspect of artistic production and consequently, seriality, 7
in as much as “Work, specifically work in series, becomes the opportunity for
speech.” 5 This opportunity for speech may create a space for the viewer to
assume that he/she is not seeing all that there is to see. If the work is not
complete and autonomous, if it is felt to be contingent upon something outside
of itself, the viewer can expect more to come and wonder about what is not
present. Discourse thus fills this void, this gap that work opens by its
incompleteness. Equally important as this incitement to discourse, in my mind,
is his description of a practice of vicious contingencies, where no single product
of artistic effort enjoys an autonomous position, but rather is linked to a
continuum. The work then involves an implied and necessary future, and the
work calls this future into being and foreshadows it. The need and promise of
the future, the potential for more things to be added in the lateral spread of the
accumulation, assures the inconclusiveness of the enterprise. You cannot be
sure if all players are present. This discourse that has taken a front seat in
current practice serves its master well, so that when “post-modernism ‘speaks of
itself’ it does so only to ‘narrate its own contingency, insufficiency, lack of
transcendence’ (his quote from Owens)”.6 This, Singerman continues, quoting
from Owens, sets up the practice as a speculative one: “In its self-naming and in
its demands on the future, this Postmodernism ‘guarantees that there is a
meaning to know and thus confers legitimacy upon history (and especially the
history of learning). It insists on and is driven by the knowledge or the fear that
something remains to be determined, something that hasn’t yet been
determined.”7
5 "Professing Postmodernism: The visiting Artist and the Model,” Howard Singerman,
October.Spr.1993. p. 174.
6 Ibid, p. 183.
Further he states that: 8
....there is no end to the production of work within graduate school that is given within the work
and its meanings, that can be related to the work’s transparent address to its own history or to the
visible world. The student work is always an open work; it is always on its way to somewhere else,
to being somewhere else. It exists as a kind of place marker, only in relation to another work
produced offstage, or rather, off a number of stages.8
What is Owens actually referring to, though? Is it an incitement to discourse
as Singerman asserts? Owens, in “The Allegorical Impulse: Toward a Theory
of the Postmodern,” (Parts 1 & 2) is concerned with proposing that these
symptoms- illegibility, incompleteness, and as-yet-unrealized potential- are the
symptoms, historically as well as presently, of allegory. He explains that
“allegory is consistently attracted to the fragmentary, the imperfect, the
incomplete," and that in an allegory, “images both proffer and defer a promise of
meaning: they both solicit and frustrate our desire that the image be directly
transparent to its signification. As a result, they appear strangely incomplete-
fragments or runes which must be deciphered."'9
What Singerman seems to picking up on in Owens is his description of the
reciprocity between the visual and the verbal which allegory proposes: “
words are often treated as purely visual phenomenon, while images are
offered as scripts to be deciphered," and later, “In allegory, the image is a
hieroglyph; an allegory is a rebus- writing composed of concrete images.”io |
am thinking specifically here of the visual presentation of my texts in the
installation as well as how all of the elements in the installation had to be taken
as a whole, even if the criteria governing the whole couldn't be clearly
8 “ The Allegorical Impulse; Toward a Theory of the Postmodern,” Craig Owens, Beyond
Recognition: Representation. Power, and Culture, p. 182.
9 Ibid, p. 55.
10 Ibid. p. 57.
established or discerned. I think that there was a clear sense that all of the 9
elements in the installation were connected somehow. Owen’s historical
analysis of Modernism’s reluctance to accept allegory and the subsequent
Postmodern tendency toward the allegorical is far more complex than a
synopsis here can relate. For my purposes, his description of how allegory
actually works is what is most helpful. “Allegorical narratives tell the story of the
failure to read..."11 This is the key statement of the essay. Owens feels that the
allegorical impulse which he sees in Postmodernism is a result of our trying to
read, to interpret. Because meaning is in crisis ( due to the acknowledgement
of the impossibility of transcendental, objective truth; that everything is a
construction and therefore ideological; and that there is nothing outside of the
text, etc.), our collective results are only fragmentary. Owens asserts that
“Allegory is thus also an emblem of mortality, of the inevitable dissolution and
decay to which everything is subject.”12 Allegory discovers in its reading, its
own fundamental illegibility. He continues: “We thus encounter once again the
unavoidable necessity of participating in the very activity that is being
denounced precisely in order to denounce it. All of the work discussed in this
essay is marked
by a similar complicity, which is the result of its fundamentally deconstructive
impulse.”12 This deconstructive impulse is allegorical. In relation to this, I have
begun to think about what my expectations were with "Baseball's Been Good To
Me" and what actually happened, how the objects and stories actually
functioned together. My elaborate and well planned construct-Baseball's Been
Good To Me- ultimately failed in the very thing is was design to do- link
11 “ The Allegorical Impulse: Toward a Theory of Postmodernism, Part 2", Craig Owens, Beyond
Recognition: Representation, Power, and Culture, p. 73.
12 Ibid. p. 77.
13 Ibid, p. 85.
things together. All of my individual pieces were indeed connected, but not 10
only in accordance with the conceptual framework I designed for them. What
was always a dangerous presence in the project was that which we could not
see, the presence of the absent part of the accumulation which may exist either
as pure potential- things to be added later, more elements- or things that exist
but were not presented in this particular manifestation. The whole was never
readable but always undermined, left open for questioning because I was not
making any claims as to it being complete. Irigaray is therefore wrong in her
assertion that incoherence would not be the result of her universe in expansion.
A never-ending accumulation can be nothing but incoherence. Another way in
which the link was undermined was the existence of other, unstated
connections- connections unclaimed by me within the conceptual framework of
Baseball’ s Been Good To Me. These connections-more organic habits or
preferences, if you will- which I’m still looking at, seem to govern the
connections between the cloud photos and the Mousehead. for example, or the
aesthetic similarities between pieces. Whether or not Baseball’ s Been Good To
M e is a contemporary allegory I’m not sure. However, the allegorical as a
structural model as described by Owens has been an interesting way for me to
analyze it.
One other way in which to think about allegory is to look at the characters in
the stories. Are they allegorical? If so, what do each of the characters
represent? If one were to think of these stories as allegories, I suppose that the
narrator, myself, could represent the will to action and desire (or, at least, the
desire to desire, which is something quite different). The other characters
represent desirability, objects of desire, but also the impossibility of desire.
They could represent not the fulfilling of desire, but the pornographic pleasure
of sublimation and deferral. In this case, the allegorical interpretation is after
the fact. In the future, however, the construction of transparent, allegorical 11
characters is something that I’m thinking about for my
stories.
Both Singerman and Owens are trying to describe both texts, finished
products, and the processes which produced those texts. I can only interpret
Baseball’ s Been Good To Me with the models at my disposal. If one doesn’t
work, I have to try another. The interpretation is just as much a creative act as
is the making of the work itself and just as difficult, whether performed by a critic,
theorist or the artist herself. The work should force the interpreter to create
new systems or models of interpretation. Unfortunately, however, this is too
hard for most of us, including myself. Usually, we can only adopt modes of
interpretation that have already been created for us.
12
Bibliography
Lacan, Jacques, Ecrits, Selected Writings, W. W. Norton & Company, New York,
London, 1977.
Modleski, Tania, “Time and Desire in the Woman’s Film,” Home is Where the
Heart Is,
Ed. by Christine Gledhill, BFI Publishing, London, 1987.
Owens, Craig , Beyond Recognition: Representation. Power, and Culture.
University of California Press, Berkeley, Los Angeles, Oxford, 1992.
Singerman, Howard, “Professing Postmodernism: The Visiting Artist and the
Model," October, Spring 1993.
Appendix 1
Four Stories from “ Baseball's Been Good To M e”
Number 1 14
With each and every prototype that he produced for me, the pattern of design
became clearer. From a distance, the geometric sections were accurate and
regular yet their division seemed organic and natural. Upon closer inspection, I
could see that the sections were the same size but that their borders were
imperfect and always slightly askew and irregular. He gave special emphasis
to these borders that ran between the small square sections, describing how
they were formed, their thickness, etc. His care and diligence when describing
these pieces moved me nearly to tears on more than one occasion. It was
clear to me that his homesickness weighed heavily on his heart and the re
creation of these pieces was the only link he was able to maintain to that
beloved place. His game was played far away, he explained, and was so
particular to his people that there wasn’t a single practice for him here that
would not pale in comparison. There was nothing to comfort him here. I was
sad for him and it was hard to witness such loneliness. Staring into his eyes,
though foreign and oddly shaped, I detected a longing there that was not hard
to recognize. He did mention that the one set of actions here that could be
remotely linked to his native practice and sensibility was our national pastime,
baseball. He was quick to add, however, that this connection was of the most
indirect and highly speculative kind. He was so proud, as if he could not admit
to a strong connection with us. When pressed to explain such a conclusion, he
said only that the arena was slightly similar and that the distance between
participants was nearly equal to his native practice. This combined with the
similarity of the game pieces that he had already established was enough to
convince him that this connection was a sound one. The rules governing how
the action was played out were, he insisted, in no way similar to his process, but
the arena and the configuration of the participants were just barely familiar
enough to stir within him a nostalgia so fervent that it was shocking. To 15
witness such strong emotion from what up till then had been such a stoic
creature caught me off guard. My brief indignation at such an outpouring not
withstanding, I directed all of my attention towards the pieces and towards
committing his explanations to memory. He moved me. I found myself
compelled to make every effort to document his descriptions and prototypes. I
very much wanted to fix the visual aesthetic in my mind‘s eye because I had an
early premonition of its vast importance to my future. I must say that I have
never been disappointed on this point.
I have been working, from that moment forward, to savor the memory of his
sentiment and to recreate the look and feel of what he imparted to me. In
particular, I have concentrated on the pieces themselves as they seem to me to
be the most tangible result of his presence. It often pains me to know that they
are not perfect. I look at them and become frustrated with myself for their
imperfection. Worst of all, I know that he too would be gravely disappointed. I
continue to try to ‘get it right’ out of reverence and because I know that
somehow his spirit watches over me and that I am obligated.
Number 2
The stadium was half-filled, far too hot and sticky with eight and a half innings
worth of trampled beer and public goo. I hated it all and Philip knew it. A warm
and solidifying camaraderie was the desired effect of this outing but I don’t think
that either of us really believed in it. I was twelve- an idiotic, albeit tender, age.
Philip could never leave until the very end, no matter that the game was as
good as decided and that most of the sane ones had begun their early exit. He
was immovable until the very end and death of it all. There was no use in trying
to reason with him and I was left with no choice but to sit and watch these men
in a field of action that was so slow it was painful. It was during just such an
ungodly wait that it happened- the smashing of my brain that was so sudden, 16
so jarring, so uncalled for that I distinctly remember the unreality of it all. Panic
stricken warnings from Philip and the instant vision of his flailing arms in a last
minute attempt at protection were my final connecting bits to that day in the sun.
A just reward for the torture of an entire afternoon of baseball. Pain, the
heaviness of my eyelids and the uncharacteristic silence of the stadium were
the only stimuli making their way to my damaged brain. I remember thinking
that Philip was probably hysterical and calling to me but I couldn't hear
anything. The only other sensation I had was that of an incredible dance going
on inside my eyelids. Their heaviness was so great that I could not budge them
open, nor did I really want to after awhile because this display was like nothing I
had ever seen. Stars were twinkling on the most vibrant orange and pinkish
background and I came to have the feeling that I never wanted to open my eyes
again. It was so beautiful. I mentally willed this vision to stay. The emergency
room technician said that when a recently traumatized patienf’sees stars” they
normally only experience this phenomenon for a matter of seconds. The fact
that my stars stayed with me from the moment of impact until well after I had
arrived at the hospital not only impressed him but made him think that it was an
indication of something, what type of something he didn’t say, and this
apparently sent Philip into yet another fit of worrying. Philip, having a weak
constitution in general, had become sick to his stomach and was lying down in
the waiting room when I finally opened my eyes. I learned that day that he
could not be completely relied upon in an emergency situation. There was
another brief attempt by the intern to discuss the length of my star gazing as well
as the amazing colors that I’d seen, but it was all beginning to fade very rapidly
from my mind’s eye. I couldn’t say any more about it at the time but when we
got home, Philip, so personally traumatized by the incident and flexing his
amateur psychology muscles, insisted I make drawings and paintings of 17
these colors and of the stars. He felt that I needed to express my feelings about
the trauma through art. He meant well. More to humor him than for cathartic
self expression I made lots of paintings trying to recreate the field I saw behind
my closed eyelids that fateful day. Most of these paintings were large filled
pages of color, sometimes divided into sections and sometimes just filling the
whole page. The color was by far the most difficult aspect of the experience to
capture. Eventually the recollection of the stars became a secondary concern
and the recounting of the colors took prominence. It was not exactly a
combination of orange and pink yet neither did I have the sense that I should be
painting two separate colors. I became frustrated and eventually bored, and
having convinced Philip that I had ‘worked through my feelings’ on the subject, I
stopped making the paintings. Over the years the colors have come back to me
from time to time and I’ve kept the paintings to remind me of what that sixty-three
minutes of closed eyelids bliss was like. Recently, I’ve tried to make a new
painting of the colors but it doesn’t really work. It’s never quite right or never
quite the same. I haven’t come close to anything as good as that again, either
visually or sensually, so I continue to drag out the old paintings knowing that I
can hardly afford at this point in life to let the incident fade from memory. It was
too good.
The Dervish
A dervish went down to Georgia, some say that he was looking for a soul to
steal. Others insisted that he was merely passing through and gave him ample
room. He needed it, certainly, because he lived so large and usually required
several cubic feet of physical, as well as psychological, space around him at all
times. If such a space was unavailable or unmaintainable for the desired
duration, he would just sit around quietly. Generally, he never laid around. Any
upper body closeness to the earth always made him uncomfortable. He 18
must have had his reasons. Once, he did submit to a high four poster bed,
reassured by the three feet or so separating the mattress from the floor, and I
remember this time well. I can see him there still, lying, not quite relaxed but at
least quiet, arms and legs outstretched. He was, in fact, sort of sprawled, not
undignified, but definitely more undone than normal to be sure. I’ve certainly
never seen him come unglued, if that’s what you’re thinking. In Georgia, he
reached a happy compromise between the idiosyncrasies of the southerners
and his own queer habits. Of course, much of this is inconsequential, due to his
short stay. I am nearly certain that had he been there to steal a soul, I would
have known. Nothing, absolutely nothing, has led me to this conclusion. Even
when I bear in mind the adage that he himself often repeated to me, “all is within
the realm of the possible,” I cannot imagine that this was the case. It could not
have been so. Spatially, in fact, it would have been impossible. The several
cubic feet that he required around his person at all times would have prevented
him from approaching anyone closely enough in order to try. But rumors
persist. They die hard like Georgian hail pellets melting on the ground. Apart
from the bed scene and the occasional sit around, I’ve rarely seen his feet break
contact with the ground. His feet touching the ground was the bond that
anchored him to this world, to life itself. Surely, to acquire a soul one would
have to maneuver in such a way as to break this bond. These, among others,
are the reasons I resist the rumors so forcefully. They smack of implausibility. In
order to be absolutely certain, however, some proposed that a test for conjury
be enacted upon the dervish. The prescription for such a test was vague,
involving a separation of the feet of the practitioner from the ground for a
determined length of time. This test was never enacted but it stood ready to be
applied if need be, and thus gave comfort to the few who were wary. Only on
one occasion did the dervish come under serious suspicion, when an 19
observer swore that he detected conjury at work during a ball game that was
concluding unfavorably for the fan in question. This overly imaginative fan
claimed that our dervish was not only capable of conjury, but was also endowed
with telekinetic powers that were being employed to alter the trajectory of the
ball in play! Thrown out later as the delusions of a disgruntled gambler, the
sting of this accusation never quite left the dervish. It was in this slightly hurt
and dejected state that the dervish and I had what could be considered our own
‘private’ incident. I was poised on the sidewalk, knowing that his path would
eventually bring him near me. As he approached, I stiffened with anticipation of
his passing and steadied myself mentally. I purposefully wore shorts so that my
legs would be bare. As he passed, his skirts ruffled and swept over my bare
ankles with a gentleness and sweetness that I have never forgotten. I stood
motionless there on the sidewalk, in plain view of everyone on the street, for
several minutes, languishing in the memory of his touch, savoring and
prolonging the tingling on my ankles. When I came back to my senses, he was
already out of sight. I was later to learn that apart from being a mortal blow to
intercultural relations, the conjury accusation had so wounded him spiritually,
that he set about that night to return home. He sent several late night
telegraphs, one of which I managed to retrieve from the telegraph office and it is
now in my collection, it reads: “stay here untenable, insufficient space
requirements, all parties suspicious by nature, recommend that no further entry
visas be given, am injured spiritually, leaving for home tonight. Stop."
Return to the Blue Lagoon
The accidental should never be confused with the incidental. While there
may very well be such a thing as a pure accident, the incidental should be
regarded with far more suspicion. Had I persuaded myself that the following 20
was a mere accident, I'm certain that it would not have figured so prominently in
my oeuvre. As it stands, I had the presence of mind, fortunately, to recognize a
spade as a spade and attribute the whole unbelievable truth to the realm of the
incidental. The incidental, I have since concluded, covers those instances
which seem random or accidental but which , in reality, occur because of some
type of inclination, proclivity or predetermined little something on the part of the
individual. It is this predisposition that drives one toward certain circumstances.
I now trust that what happened was too appropriate to be chalked up to mere
accident or twist of fate. I also know that without this realization- this belief that
the occurrence was more than mere accident- the memory would never have
gone to that dark spot in my mind where things check in but not out.
A summer's day in the Mexican Caribbean was how it started, with me,
rigged for skin diving , walking slowly out into the water, oblivious of the pivotal
events that were about to unfold. As I think about it now I say to myself, “how
could she not have known," “how could she have not had some sense, some
small indication of what was to come?" But it simply was not like that. It was in
a state of virtual ignorance that I came to know how to swim with fish.
It began as I came upon a large school of blue and yellow fish, each about
eight inches long and swimming in a huge, lovely group. They shimmered,
reflected and filtered the midday sun as it reached me underwater in a way I
have never forgotten. In fact, even now, I often refer to this type of reflection as a
“body of the lagoon" type or, sometimes, a “silvery moon lagoon" type of
reflection. It helps me to keep it all fresh. In order to receive this reflection
effectively, however, I had to dive under water as much as possible in order to
have a better view of their collective body. Had I worn a scuba tank, this diving
would not have been necessary and I would have been able to remain
underwater for an extended period of time. However, I stand behind my 21
decision to go “au natural” and I believe that this purer state also aided in my
seeming approachable to them. While at first alarmed by their numbers and
the claustrophobic feeling that came over me as the school caused the water
around me to darken , I eventually relaxed and began to swim with them. As
they blocked the sun with their collective body, I adopted their shrouded rhythm
and sway. Soon, I was completely enveloped. I swam and then they swam.
They swam and then I swam. I’m sure you can see what was beginning to
happen. I loved the little scratchy touches against my skin that the fish
inadvertently delivered, as they became attracted to the shiny metal of my mask,
watch and fins. They nibbled and pecked at whatever gave the tiniest reflection,
even the gold thread label of my Mossimo bikini bottoms. At one point perhaps
a dozen fish were working on my bathing suit while a halo of them swarmed at
my mask and head. It wasn’t until I felt a sharp pain on my face, on the outside
of my left eye- a sharp kiss given to me by one trying to avail himself of the small
metal tip at the end of my mask strap- that I awoke from this revelry. Obviously
impatient with the long wait for this shinny morsel, he had become anxious.
Startled by the pain, I flailed suddenly and before I knew what I had done, I
sent them scurrying in all directions. I tried to be stay calm. Frantic to have
them back, I floated motionless for nearly ten minutes, treading water in the
least disruptive manner possible and exiting to the surface for air only when
absolutely necessary. Slowly, they returned and started to gently take up their
former positions beside me. Our swimming lasted nearly all day. Having
tasted it, however, I knew that it was not enough. The following morning,
exhausted by the previous day's swim, I called home for some gold and silver
glitter and waterproof glue. After searching the entire island for a metallic suit,
this was my only recourse. When the package arrived at the hotel, I went
straight to my room and crafted myself. It wasn’t an easy operation, but what 22
a site I was. I set out immediately for the lagoon in this altered state of reflection
just as the sun was reaching its highest point in the sky. Like most of us, I was
after the optimum effect. Suffice it to say, that my new incarnation pleased them
immensely and their appreciation was expressed forthrightly. Their casual
inadvertence became my seminal incidence and that is now, after my return to
the lagoon, all that I want.

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Asset Metadata

Creator Johnson, Kathleen Marie (author)

Core Title Master Of Fine Arts Thesis

Degree Master of Fine Arts

Degree Program Fine Arts

Publisher University of Southern California (original), University of Southern California. Libraries (digital)

Tag Fine Arts,OAI-PMH Harvest

Language English

Contributor Digitized by ProQuest (provenance)

Advisor Weisberg, Ruth (committee chair), [illegible] (committee member), [Jang] (committee member)

Permanent Link (DOI) https://doi.org/10.25549/usctheses-c18-8392

Unique identifier UC11356806

Identifier 1378417.pdf (filename),usctheses-c18-8392 (legacy record id)

Legacy Identifier 1378417-0.pdf

Dmrecord 8392

Document Type Thesis

Rights Johnson, Kathleen Marie

Type texts

Source University of Southern California (contributing entity), University of Southern California Dissertations and Theses (collection)

Access Conditions The author retains rights to his/her dissertation, thesis or other graduate work according to U.S. copyright law. Electronic access is being provided by the USC Libraries in agreement with the au...

Repository Name University of Southern California Digital Library

Repository Location USC Digital Library, University of Southern California, University Park Campus, Los Angeles, California 90089, USA