Back when the project was looking to be more humorous and also include some stereotyping (the race cards would have included some overtly racist material), I looked up a bunch of both purposely racist art from the past, and art based upon the aforementioned. These pieces by Dawolu Jabari Anderson fall under the latter, as he implants the racist caricatures of the past into old-school outlandish comic book covers. Since they're both fictional, they're a match made in heaven.
Digitizing Race
This interactive project by Lisa Nakamura depicts a Jennifer Lopez music video from multiple viewpoints that a person can flip back and forth from. The split represents a paradigmatic dichotomy: the body is that of the Latina, the woman of color, and the mind is that of a white man. This piece sort of leans on gender theory as much as racial, but I felt it was interesting from the standpoint that you could swap your racial viewpoint.
Black People Love Us!
This very... strange, hilarious site features the testimonials and tribulations of an average white couple and their many black friends. Of course they feel very modern and with-it now that they're friends with black people. The friends have their own talkbacks as well, with such gems as "Sally always says things that make me feel special, like: 'You're so cool, you're different, you're not like other Black people!'" It's all very surreal, but very amazing.
Alright, just a few final words about the race scanner project before we put this thing to bed. I was just amazed at how well the whole thing turned out (with special thanks to the super amazing laser cutter. That thing is badass). I also didn't realize until the critique just how different the project had ended up being. What started as something we were all laughing about, talking about different stupid features we could input on a scanner that would detect and discriminate race, soon became diluted of its humor into what could easily come off as a very serious project. This wasn't exactly intentional, and I'm not saying it's a bad thing. Although some of my work can be outlandishly ridiculous, I'm also a big proponent of making humor more subtle. In this case, the idea of this scanner that determines your race and then you getting stamped was incredibly funny to me, that I felt it didn't need anything else added to it. It would all be ancillary and unnecessary. But in the end, I almost feel that it became far too sterile. Well, sterile in concept. Someone brought up in critique how the idea behind it may not have been original enough of a point on the topic of race, and I agree with him to some extent. I generally hate art projects that tread on such familiar ground, because most everything that could be said or done has been. But, there are some that can break the mold and be both visually appealing and engaging, as well as slightly absurd. I feel if this were in a sterile gallery space with a stamping attendant who didn't say anything, and you were in and out of there within like ten seconds, it would be extremely effective, especially if your race was miscalculated. So I guess in summation I'd say the project came out differently than I'd thought, but I still love it, but feel it would be even better in a more controlled gallery environment. Go team go.
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