Homebody

Abstract

This thesis represents a foundation of research and ideas upon which I build my practice as an artist. By closely examining my chosen artistic site, the home, and my artistic medium, the body in performance, I hope to clarify the Submitted to the Department of Architecture on August 8, medium, the body in performance, I hope to clarify the 2008 intentions of my practice.The homebody project analyzes the dynamic relationship of in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Science in Visual Studies the individual body to the individual home site in the cycliat the Massachusetts Institute of Technology cal process of everyday identity production. This involves an interrogation of habit, the choreography of repeated gestures over time that confirm inscribed cultural norms, and the habitual topographies of the private sphere.I rely on both personal and theoretical histories and discourses to develop an understanding of the homebody situation and its larger implications. Establishing the home-body relationship as both deeply intimate and culturally determined, I show how a creative practice sited in the home can disrupt or even reinvent the habit continuum, and suggest new modes of operation within the cycle of home-body coproduction.