Claire Walgren

Claire Julia Walgren is an artist from Minneapolis, Minnesota currently working in Phoenix, Arizona. She is a current student at Arizona State University to receive a BFA in Intermedia in May of 2024. Working primarily in video and performance, she attempts to challenge societal and political norms by exploring themes such as substance abuse, rape culture, religion, and personal experience and identity. In addition to documenting her processes through video, Walgren often utilizes photo and text documentation. She is inspired by feminist and women performance artists like Linda Montano and Marina Abramovic.

Proposal for Project #1:

My proposal for Project 1 is a performance for the camera, and will also include additional video editing and audio. I will perform a gesture, modifying it or the camera as it relates to different words relating to the body (i.e. endurance, strength, proximity, vulnerability). 

Project #1:

I chose to use push-ups as my repeating gesture because it directly relates to endurance. I began the push-ups balanced on two chairs in order to highlight the next portion, strength, where I do the same pushups but on the floor. I wanted to think about strength in terms of power and hierarchy, while this portion also highlights struggling with physical strength as I continue the push-ups. The same floor push-ups continue in the next portion, however proximity is highlighted through a closer camera angle. In the last portion, vulnerability, I tried to repeat the push-ups with my belly facing up.

The audio used throughout the video is a push-up test usually used in elementary and middle school P.E. classes. The strong male voice plays an important role in the video as I wanted to investigate themes of rape culture and male power, and this contrasts with the fact that this push-up test might be associated with grade school. It also provided me with a structure to complete the push-ups. In each portion of the video, the push-up test audio resets and also continues to play from the previous set.

Proposal for Project #2:

For this project, I would like to perform three Fluxus scores which I have done in a previous assignment, this time paying attention to where I focus my eyes, the way I am sitting and moving, and generally being more mindful of the way I am performing. I would also like to make edits to the original audio to create overlaps and repetition like I have done with the audio in project 1.

Project #2:

I have performed three Fluxus scores relating to eating, chewing, and swallowing:

Orange Event Number 8 - Bengt af Klintberg

Eat an orange as if it were an apple. (Hold it, unpeeled, between forefinger, middle finger and thumb, bite big mouthfuls, etc.)

Chewed Drawing - Larry Miller

Chew a nice piece of notebook or drawing paper.

Drink II - Ben Vautier

Performers drink as much as they can drink, as fast as possible.

It was important for me to try these performances again but with more intention behind my actions and to become more 'confrontational' with the camera through holding eye contact and letting the fluids drip down my neck instead of leaning forward to prevent this. The three scores have been edited into one video. I have made edits to the audio so that some sounds from different scores are playing at different times. This creates an overlapping of chewing and swallowing sounds meant to make the viewer question what they are hearing/seeing.

Proposal for Final Project:

For my final project, I want to incorporate similar endurance type subject matter and sound design to what I have used in my first two projects. It will include a performance for the camera as well as additional documentation of the process. I want to highlight the passing of time through a durational element of the piece as well.

Final Project:

Similar to project 1 with the the push-ups, my final project includes a performance where I repeatedly step onto a chair with paint covered feet. I wanted to document the process of making a physical 'end product' from the actions I perform. I decided to do this process as a way to explore my symptoms of chronic pain, paying closer attention to the way specific parts of my body are feeling, and tracking those feelings. Three times I stepped up and down for five minutes on, and then five minutes off as a photograph the progress of the painting and log the sensations in my body. Each time I resume the stepping I use a new color of paint.

After the process of stepping onto the chair was completed, I transferred the notes I took via typewriter. The visual of the typewriter interrupts the performance when I begin a break and resume the stepping. I chose to include the audio of the typewriter through the entirety of the video to highlight the tracking of time and symptoms. This sound design was meant to relate to my previous projects in the sense that it takes focus away from the original audio of the visuals being shown.