Congrats on making it to the artist statement.

I want to begin by acknowledging the number of unfortunate events that have come to alter the ways in which we live out lives during this unprecedented time. 2020 will be a year in history that will forever be intertwined with social unrest among the people and its government - plagued by the systematic injustices of police brutality and distrust that the people have against its national leaders. The start of this particular decade is also going to be defined by the health crisis that took place. The sudden rise of COVID-19 cases came to damage the livelihood of millions by forcing many to lose their jobs and lock themselves away in fixed spaces; assuming they had these spaces to begin with. The fact of the matter is that this combination of social unrest and economic hardship - all in the midst of a pandemic - interrupted the life that we once knew.

In response to these events, I hoped to create a platform that depicts how we the people may be feeling as a result of our country’s current state. I did not intend to address specific events. I also did not intend to provide solutions for the problems and issues we may be experiencing emotionally. The Out of Body Experience was an outlet for me to convey the theme of constant interruptions that we have been facing in society. Each page that is tied to an emotion is motivated by this idea that we feel as though we are living in alternate reality where neither things, good nor bad, last forever. It is quite disheartening to know that the constant interruptions throughout the website are meant to bring us back to Earth. I leave no space for the user to drown in their emotions as it may cause them to get lost in a cycle of infatuation, or lack thereof. Additionally, The Out of Body Experience pays attention to the occasional extremes that one may be feeling, outside of the typical emotions.

It may be important to note my other personal inspirations for this piece and hopefully it can reveal some of the emotional challenges that others may be experiencing as well. It has been difficult to cope with and adjust to the things going on in my life given the circumstances. As a result, I found myself in a state of limbo. I struggled with understanding where I was at mentally and emotionally and forgetting how to deal with these feelings effectively now that my life has changed so much in the past year. I am still in that state. I believe that sometimes our emotions get the best of us, which cause an individual to act and think in ways they don’t mean. Self-evaluation is necessary. Always ask yourself how you are feeling. And understand that the tough times won’t last forever; but also take that with a grain of salt when you are feeling joyful. I do not say this to make a point that you should dwell in your emotions. Instead, I offer my audience the opportunity to maximize and embrace their moments of joy, but also be accepting of themselves in times of sorrow.

I hope you enjoy/enjoyed going exploring the website as it was a pleasure creating it!


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Summary of pages:

Welcome to ‘The Out of Body Experience’:

This is the home page. In it you will find a background that resembles that of a TV standby screen. It is used to articulate the sudden and initial interruptions that you will face throughout the website. I reiterate the title of the website as The Out of Body Experience because it highlights emotions that I would describe as out of the norm; an escape from reality. The television with the fly represents the notion that some things are not as real as they seem - I compare aspects of the digital world to that of artificial reality. The audio is intended to further fracture our ideas of consistency and structure. To access this document, you can click the television set in the middle of the screen.

Self-Evaluation:

This page allows the user to perform an initial self-assessment on how they are feeling. The user is able to click the facial icons shown. Each face is associated with a color that I felt were associated with the following emotions: red for extremely sad, blue for sad, green for neutral, yellow for happy, and multi-colored for extremely happy. The icons - extremely sad and extremely happy - reappear to show how these are emotions outside of the ones we may typically feel and might only appear on certain occassions. Their outside placement reinforces the title of the website. ‘Extremely sad’ is red because it represents a dangerous emotion that can prove to be detrimental to our health. ‘Sad’ is blue because we associate sadness with tears and rain. ‘Neutral’ is green because I felt it was calming and therefore gave a feeling of contentment. ‘Happy’ is yellow because that is the color we typically associate with joy and brightness. ‘Extremely happy’ is multicolored to symbolize a feeling we crave outside of the norm; an escape from reality.

Sad:

Often or not, sadness is an emotion we all have felt. The water and empty images are meant to depict the loneliness and somber that we might feel during our lows. The video was something I created to allow the user to soak in that pain only to have it fractured by the broadcast emergency audio that appeared on previous pages, bringing us back to reality. In the video, the user is being told to ‘get back to work’ in order to remind them to re-evaluate themselves and how they can make their situation better. You will also find a number of other content: words associated with the feelings of sadness and words of encouragement. Words are stacked closely to represent the layers and emotional similarities between them. To access this document, you can click the rushing river on the left of the screen. Each page also gives the user the opportunity to click on ‘how they are feeling now’ link to revisit the self-evaluation page. This is intentional because it reminds us to go through the same process of self-assessment.

Neutral:

When asked how they feel, some may say they feel ‘alright’ or they are doing ‘okay’ - neither sad nor happy - but is that really the case? Each piece of audio and visuals on this page is warped to air out my conflicting opinions about this emotion. While I understand why someone may not definitively state whether they are happy or sad, I still feel there is no true middle. We are always thinking of things that draw some type of emotion. The water here represents the feeling we get when we are in it; that is we feel like we are in another world when we are in it. The layered gif of the women dancing in a circle come from the film ‘Midsommar,’ can be an interpretation of a false reality. Words are stacked closely to represent the layers and emotional similarities between them. You can click the green art piece on the bottom right to access this document.

Happy:

Happiness is something we all should strive for. I attached another original video in which it acknowledges the user’s joy, but once again fracture it to represent the superficial emotions that are tied to it. There are going to be moments where our happiness comes to an end and we are asked to handle the emotions that are less than exciting. This vomit of a wheat field and endless loop of flowers are meant to remind us that our emotions are constantly going through a never-ending cycle where reality kicks in. Not all of it is bad though. Interruptions and unhappy events also remind us to work towards achieving that happiness. To access this document, you can click on one of the flowers located at the bottom of the screen.

Extremely Sad:

Suicide is a sensitive subject that I did not want to touch base on or go into too much depth on. For that matter I went for a simplistic approach that focused on the word “Error” and other rods of encouragement. I used this as a repetitive component of the page to encourage users to steer away from any dark thoughts they may be facing. This page is littered with elements of horror to represent the desire to escape from our current reality, but it is done so in a dark and eerie sense to depict a negative side of our emotions that I hope no one should find ourselves in. In addition to the ‘Midsommar’ image, I also included scenes from the 2002 film, ‘The Ring’ because it also presents its audience with the theme of a supernatural digital world. However, the fact of the matter is that it does exist, and for that reason only, is why I hesitantly decided to include this page. Additionally, I decided to include the images on the right because they were familiar (as seen on other pages), like that of the emotions of sadness, neutrality, and happiness. But I chose to add transparent images of horror to them to add to the superficiality of shifting emotions. To access this document, you can click the fly on the right of the screen.

Extremely Happy:

This page is meant to symbolize the other spectrum of extreme emotions. My intention here comes from the belief that, like times of extreme sadness, there are going to be times where we also want to escape to a world of extreme happiness. The things that came to mind when creating this page dealt heavily with psychedelic matters. I hope to make this another eerie page to show that there are times when extreme happiness could become detrimental to mental health because it can cause us to get lost in a world that does not exist. With this page I wanted to create a world that we all hope to go, either often or occasionally, when our current world and mind state is in a place of negativity. The videos are also visual representations of an alternate society that seems to be a utopia at its surface, but is anything but that. You can access this document by clicking on the leftmost globe.