Interview: Dana Tosic

Artist: Dana Tosic
Exhibit Name: Everyday Ephemera
Gallery: Open Studio
Dates: September 15 – October 22, 2011
Interviewed by: Michael Hansen
Aired on ArtSync: 23 September 2011

In Everyday Ephemera, Dana Tosic uses a technologically advanced method of printmaking to depict the daily activities we perform without consciousness. These physical memories, which Tosic calls “embodied perception,” are presented solely through the hands of figure and in a faint and monochromatic colour scheme.

In her interview with Michael Hansen, Tosic speaks of her fascination with memory and the challenges of presenting it visually. To accurately replicate her chosen actions, Tosic used of the 3D scanners available from her time at the Royal College of Art to capture her own movements. Tosic reveals that while she had hoped to record movement on the scanner, the results were blurred beyond the point of recognition. Instead, numerous poses representing one action were captued and later combined. Thus, these stagnant images still capture a film-like image in motion.

Asked about the source of her fascination with memory, Tosic reveals that she “was interested in the ways of which we decide what actions to attribute meaning or importance to.” Though the actions depicted are universal, such as washing one’s face and peeling fruit, Tosic admits that “there could be an underlying narrative going through them.” Yet the human face is deliberately obscured, with focus placed instead on the figures’ moving hands. What emerges is the uncanny relationship between mind and body, memory and present activity, and the performative nature of even the most mundane actions.

-K.F.