Briar Parks Animated Arts Thesis Fall 2018

Abstract

The Hyperflat artist aggregate is a collective art practice that doesn’t distinguish between art and the everyday performance. In my thesis project I have created a system / stomach designed to digest hierarchies, and make feedback loops out of the leftover fragments. it is a system of humans and puppets working to shatter dichotomies in identity, building connections and harnessing the paradoxes between contrasting perspectives. A person’s position in the Hyperflat artists aggregate is determined by their costume, know as a Scarab. A Scarab is a mask / hat / puppet hybrid that connects its wearer to the artists aggregate and to a language of icons. all Scarabs have an elemental and a psychic signifier built into their design / structure that is directly connected to the Hyperflat language. Scarabs are intended to shift between individual and collective identity by being worn as hats and masks. This range of functions is designed to provide the wearer with a palette of identities, a kind of toolbox for making performance art including Animation, everyday Fashion and sensory deprivation.