Performance Art Piece

Title: The Pressure on Women- Unrealistic Beauty Standards
Performer: Tracey Carrasco
Camera Person: Mariette Amici
Extras: University of Tampa student body


A special thanks to My professor of Art and Technology honors, Santiago Echeverry, for assigning the performance art piece. It made me think of an out-of-the-ordinary way to make people think, and not just think, but to think about something that needs awareness. The social issue that I decided was worthy of the assignment was the pressure on women in a mass media society society that advocates unrealistic beauty standards. The overarching insecurity that one will never reach a weight, a height, or a color for example, is pervasive.

Click the link below to view. Thank you.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w1LCAeneSoI

Reviewing Pandora

Pandora became as successful as it did because it was clever. They played upon our emotions, as Socrates would say. People like and will constantly use things that make life as easy and convenient as possible. Not only does Pandora do the music research for the listener, it allows you to further customize the playlist at the simple touch of a 'thumbs up' or 'thumbs down'. Pandora also makes it easy to discover other music groups or artists you might enjoy by suggesting them on the page. I personally prefer Pandora over any other music app because it's user friendly and because I have discovered a cheat to defeat the pesky commercials. When a commercial comes on, quickly double tap the home button, swipe up on the Pandora page, then reopen the app and your next song should play. Disclaimer: the cheat only works on an iPhone. All in all, it seems to me that Pandora mastered the art of convenience and long term customer relationship strategy.

Flip Book Animation Project

A 500 frame flip book animation on sticky notes.

Title: The Heart Tree
Illustrations by: Tracey Carrasco

The video was presented in class and received an A. It is too large of a file to upload to this website.

Corpse Project

The wine bottles in this project are decontextualized by various objects which symbolize the degeneration and demise of a young woman, or a of an entire young female generation if you choose to interpret that way. The tape measure around the neck of a bottle represents the pressure felt by young women as a result of unrealistic beauty standards set by mass media. The jewels and other female accouterments stand for the struggle and strife to meet a societal standard of beauty. And lastly yet most importantly, alcoholism becomes the young woman's coping mechanism until she consequently meets a bittersweet death. 

Compilation by: Tracey Carrasco 

Grid Art Project

A 900 square unit acrylic representation of a 10x13 ft tapestry.

Title: Emoji 

Painted by: Tracey Carrasco 

Day 5

     The Great Train Robbery by Edwin S. Porter was originally filmed in 1903. Although both, Voyage Dans La Lune and The Great Train Robbery were silent films, The Great Train Robbery was hard to follow whereas Voyage Dans La Lune was depicted in a much simpler fashion. There was a more complex sequence of events that occurred in The Great Train Robbery that might have been more clear if complemented by audio or perhaps if I had watched the film a second time again. Astoundingly one is able to see the technological advances in film from 1902 to 1903 when comparing these two silent films. The most prominent advancement I noted was the variety of camera angles. Voyage Dans La Lune had one straight on angle for the entire duration of the film. The Great Train Robbery however, depicted the characters from side angles and even from the back when they are on top of the train. I thought this was amazing. The parallel between film making and technology fit hand and glove.

Day 4

      "Le Voyage dans la Lune" (1902) by George Méliès  was surprisingly interesting for a silent, black and white film. I did not expect all the details on the set such as the rocket ship, the snow, the choreography of the aliens, and the arrival into the ocean. Before watching the short film I would not have thought a silent movie would be entertaining.  The portrayal of aliens on the moon was humorous because of the outlandish jumps and struts. I thought their reaction to the humans mimicked the way an indigenous tribe might act to trespassers perhaps of a different complexion. The aliens brought the humans to their ruler as prisoners but they escaped back to Earth with one of the creatures in tow. I believe the film was meant to be outrageous on purpose; it was too far fetched even for 1902. It seems more like the absurdity was actually a device to create wonder or humor in the audience. At the end, every one parties as does the alien. The sets were very interesting to see. In comparison to the graphics of 2015, the setting where the rocket ship landing in the sea looks like a fish tank. Nevertheless, to the audience of 1902 it likely seemed very realistic especially with the added effect of the fish and distortion caused by the old methods of film making.