Cassandra Tytler: Thwack
Thwack: An interview for Rubicon ARI
In a series of grainy, lo-fi videos, fragments of an uncanny narrative unfold simultaneously. A woman jumps about a suburban street, spouting instructions on how to beat an opponent in a fight- lilac bruises spread over her shoulders, and creep up the side of her face. The same woman then battles to destroy a wooden chair, her battered frame tearing the wood into fragments. Finally, the woman slathers make up onto her face- in the style of a Youtube tutorial- in attempt to mask her rapidly darkening bruises. But she cannot not quite conceal the yellowing indigo, which is instead emphasised by congealing powder, the garish pink of her lips. Watching Thwack is a compelling but uncomfortable experience, each video has an element of absurd performativity: you want to laugh, but a pervasive disturbing undercurrent leads you to question your first response- should you be laughing? We don’t know exactly what has happened to this woman, but it’s all too easy to imagine. An image of a dominating lover is conjured, but then everything changes-now she’s talking about a team- Maybe she is a professional fighter… Does she live on the street? We are seeing the aftermath of an event we cannot understand. It is this uncertainty that consolidates Cassandra Tytler’s exhibition Thwack: when discussing violence and gender, it’s all too easy to become didactic, instead Tytler uses humour and narrative to provide a cultural criticism that is more complex and ambiguous.
KP: Looking back as your practice as a whole, can you tell me a little about the early stages ?
CT: Originally my background was in cinema actually. I did a double major in cinema and media studies, so it was more theoretical- From there, I did a subject where we got to make our own films. It was through that that I actually started making stuff…I was also working in a video store back then, so I was completely immersed.
KP: I feel like in a way, sometimes you don’t even realise at the time, but you soak everything up like a sponge…
CT: That really was an education in itself, just being able to watch so much…And then from there, I got a tiny show-reel and I studied Media Arts at RMIT… That’s when I really started making things…My work was more linear in narrative back then…
KP: How did this particular work evolve?
CT: Well I was thinking about the act of embodying personas, really becoming another character-but not necessarily acting, really becoming this realistic version- it was more creating this character that embodied ideas, my own take on certain things…
KP: Yeah, she [the main character] does almost seem a little like an archetype…
CT: Yeah I wanted to use this persona to communicate my own reaction to something, specifically with these works, violence, violence against one form of society, I think it’s very much about gender as well-I am specifically looking at violence relating to women… the banality of it… we just kind of accept these things, whereas in fact we’re really forced in certain forms of thinking, ways of acting, and so I wanted to use this character to communicate that, she’s the same person, but in many ways, she’s different in every film-different versions of how I see violence symbolically- but there’s also obvious allusions, the bruises all over her, to domestic violence…
KP: She’s so interesting, what she’s talking about, what’s really uncanny… The very first thing I thought is that you straddle that line between really fully embodying a character in a naturalistic way, and melodrama. There’s something slightly off, there’s nothing ‘wrong’ enough to fully think: that’s a little weird…Do you know what I mean? You can tell you’re acting, but there’s nothing specific that gives it away-you’re left with a sense of unease…
CT: Yeah, well that was my idea, I didn’t want it to be acting as such. I tried to embody this character, so she would be recognised as a fully-formed figure, but without necessarily creating what you would consider a “normalised” or “realistic” persona. It’s like I wanted her character to symbolise a metaphorical state or idea, the idea here being that gendered violence is so ingrained in our everyday to the point of banal acceptance.
KP: It’s more that there’s a faint feeling that, as a viewer you’re slipping between the naturalistic and the caricature, almost imperceptibly- there’s something surprisingly convincing about her-something so genuine about her, that even though you know you’re acting… But you really do slip between being very performative, but with the sense that she is real- the vagueness of each different event- I love the fact that every time you think you have figured out what’s happening, it twists and turns and you’re back in that place of uncertainty…
CT: Yeah, I never wanted to say ‘this is the problem’, my reaction, my feeling was, in terms of violence, it’s such as big thing… It’s [violence] interwoven into the fabric of how we live our lives… I like that idea that the viewer is searching, thinking: What happened? I didn’t want to focus on the idea of playing a victim-I didn’t want it to be condescending…as if I was colonising the pain of other people’s experience with violence. My aim was to explore my internalised reaction to violence in a deeper, less institutionalised way…
And that was so intentional-It’s such a complex subject matter…
KP: It’s not didactic. But there is something tragic, about her acceptance of the ubiquity of violence… There are moments when as a viewer you join her: you go along with accepting this violence… There’s a denial to the reality of her situation…She embodies that split-there’s an acknowledgement of what’s happens, but there’s a real fear of being truly aware of what’s happened…
KP: Even in terms of the makeup, the bruising- it almost looks real, but not quite- There’s no specific clue that the bruises are fake, you can never quite figure out what gives away the artifice, but it is there…It all seems really slippery- I definitely think that the setting helps…
KP: She’s also fascinating as there’s a vulnerability- There’s an absurdity to her characterisation, almost like an element of Commedia Del Arte, a feistiness, but sometimes she seems quite small, even sexual at times…She slips between all of these…
CT: And that was so intentional-It’s such a complex subject matter…Just with my own experiences, I think my experience with that, thinking: nothing is black and white… there’s not that one villain. Well I guess the one villain is patriarchy actually… But I didn’t want to speak for anyone else’s experience and that’s why I played her myself…
KP: Yeah you don’t want to be illustrative…
KP: The work is very interesting from a temporal perspective, in a sense… there is a chronology from one work to another but the work is elusive, avoiding an overall linear narrative. As viewers we’re looking at a collection of moments in time but we can’t locate it in a discernible linear chronology… You can’t figure out when she was injured, assaulted…
KP: This work [attacking the chair] explores such a fascinating futility…perhaps evocative with an ongoing struggle against violence…But it’s also such an endurance work for you, but in a way also for the viewer, to stand there an witness this outcome of a futile attack… And it’s weird because the struggle slips between looking realistic and then at times totally fake.
CT: I was so interested in futility, in banality…
KP: It reminds me of, I mean the whole show reminds me of the kind of things you see on Youtube-but in particular- I think maybe it’s the graininess, the hand held camera…It’s kinda like those fail videos. It seems plausible that your videos could be up there…Maybe it’s an alternate universe that you have created, where there is a motivational channel, where the main character teaches viewers to respond to violence…
CT: Yeah, it kind of is like a Youtube video: I mean she’s always speaking to the camera… Talking to this invisible person
KP: It’s weird how she has soaked up all these self-help tropes in her dialogue, repeating these cheesy inspirational maxims…
CT: It’s a way for her to deny what’s happening, it’s not empowering at all…
KP: Do you see these works as one whole work?
CT: Yeah I do…
KP: This one, where you’re applying makeup- It’s very bodily… The powdery foundation on your lips weirdly draws attention to the interior of your mouth- The bloody lips. This mask-like makeup does draw attention to the eyes and mouth, the vulnerable interior of the body…
There’s this emphasis on feminine beauty, on adulterating your appearance for the appreciation of another… She jumps from wanting to be this submissive, attractive object to wanting to take someone down ferociously…
Also, I’m interested as to how this work relates to the Trocadero show…
CT: The Trocadero show explores the identity masks we put on…the way we disguise our true selves for public consumption, again in reference to gender, and violence… These works at Rubicon really explore an internalised violence where the work at Trocadero explore an external violence…
KP: Absolutely- In this [Thwack] she does seem violent towards her self- self-flagellating almost…a lot of self blame…as if she’s learning to be as violent to herself as others have been to her…which is so pertinent to anyone who experiences any kind of violence…
Cassandra Tytler is currently completing her PHD in Fine Art at Monash University. You can find out more about her exhibition Thwack at http://www.rubiconari.com.au
Her exhibition Tock Tock is on at Trocadero until the 18th of June.
http://www.cassandratytler.com
Katie Paine is an artist, writer and curator-You can find her work at katielouisepaine.com and @dreamsofspeaking on Instagram.