Australian Video Art Archive

Sarah crowEST

 

The Joy of Beauty

00:11:11 2005

This video consists of a series of vignettes of sculptural actions performed on the body suggesting cosmetic and surgical transformation of the human physique such as those observed on television shows like Extreme Makeover.  Various manifestions of crowEST’s large, bobbleheaded, feckless creature alter ego perform as the central model. Ken Bolton writes, “The creature does great harm to itself, aside from the distress it seems to feel already over its self-image. It is driven, helpless not to go on, in a frenzy of self-punishment and self-mutilation.”

- Ken Bolton, Sarah crowEST: Get Rid of Yourself Now! (Exh Cat). Adelaid: Experimental Art Foundation, Adelaide, 2005

DVD available