Don't Miss 'Three By Dayna McLeod'
All works leave Recycled Screenings on May 1st!
Dear readers/listeners/viewers,
A friendly reminder that three works by Montreal-based video and performance artist Dayna McLeod will leave Recycled Screenings at the end of the month. You can watch them all here. Please also consider making a donation! All money goes directly to the artist.
Below is a creator’s statement written by Dayna to accompany the videos:
Hung Over and Boob Cleaning, Splinter New Boots, and It’s a Date! are 3 short experimental videos that I made for 52 Pick-Up, a project that I started in 2009 that ran until 2014. 52 Pick-Up was a video production challenge for anyone looking for a weekly deadline and a low-stakes creative experience where videos and pages were not indexed or tagged with keywords or other (now commonplace) searchable metadata. I made over 100 videos, and the collection hosts approximately 3000 videos made by more than 50 international artists. Currently however, it’s kind of broken. Built in HTML, I have not been able to keep updating the site (lack of resources, time, and funding) or upload and convert the multiple video files needed to ensure playback across multiple devices without using YouTube or Vimeo, and because not all web browsers support all video formats. I could go on about 52 Pick-Up, and really just wanted to say that I KNOWAH it’s not working to the best of its ability—if there’s anyone out there with the resources and interest to update it, message me. If you want to know more about the challenges of 52 Pick-Up and projects like it, check out Alex Ketchum’s Self-produced Digital Public Scholarship from her book, Engage in Public Scholarship! A Guidebook on Feminist and Accessible Communication (2022).
Hung Over and Boob Cleaning (2009) is an edit of video diary footage from 2007 when I performed Monarchy Mama in Warsaw and Berlin, a durational performance piece where I wore a costume made of 21 vinyl breast plates that were equipped with vodka that participants could suck on. This video features me cleaning the outfit while a touch hung over.
It’s a Date! (2009) uses sound from What to Do on a Date, a 1950s educational film hosted at Prelinger Archives. The visuals are looped stills from a new camera I had bought in 2009 taken by placing it on top of a table at The Gladstone in Toronto on a night out.
Splinter New Boots (2010) centres around a pair of spike heel lace-up boots (that are trying to be ski boots?!?) that I got at a thrift store, the challenge of putting them on, and the need to get a glass of wine from the kitchen. It’s cut to Señor Coconut’s Music Non Stop.
Ultimate SUB Ultimate DOM (2009) and That’s Right Diana Barry- You Needed Me (2009) were also made as part of 52 Pick-Up, but went on to have lives of their own on the queer film and video festival circuit. Deb! (2022) and The Menopausalist (2022) are recent interpretations of performative embodiment.
Also available on the Recycled Screenings website is a conversation between Dayna and me, a curator’s statement by me, and links to more of Dayna’s videos. Watch now!!
Thank you!
Will DiGravio