Transfixion

2023. Video performance, sound, red tattoo ink, handpoke tattoo needle, red body paint, acrylic felt, wool roving, needle felting needle, fabric, hook and loop fasteners, installation of collected Raggedy Ann & Andy ephemera. 

20:17 min looping video. 

“Transfixion” is a companion piece to “Making a Raggedy Tranndy of Myself.”

The “Transfixion” video consists of footage from several artistic processes associated with “Making a Raggedy Tranndy of Myself.” It aimed to inform the audience of fiber art techniques used to create the physical sculpture, as well as showcase performative actions that the artist took to strengthen the idea of “doubling” between the doll and himself. For example, Coerr slowly, methodically tattoos two red dots in between his eyes in homage to this detail in the faces of many Raggedy dolls produced from the 1960s onward. The process of needle felting (used in the patches on Raggedy Tranndy) involves repeatedly poking wool roving to embed it permanently in the felt “skin,” which mimicks the action of handpoke tattooing living flesh. Additionally, portions of the video show how the tattoo patches may be removed, negating and queering what is typically a “permanent” body modification. The act of applying and re-applying these patches examines the agency over the body that tattoos provide to their wearers, specifically among queer and trans people.

The sound for this piece was composed by Coerr using found sound and a portable keyboard.