Olivier De Sagazan: Identity and Transfiguration.

Posted on October 27, 2012 by Jordan Edward Tallis

Exploring different performances, I came across one that stood out to me more than anyone I’d seen so far. Olivier De Sagazan is a performance artist who provokes a very different way of experimental performance, through the use of make-up and smudging it all around the body in a violent manner. Thus becoming a thrilling and eye catching piece of art. Not only does De Sagazan submerge his body in make-up but he also focuses on distorting the image of the human face, which I believe to be disturbing.

Distorting the face in a way that goes beyond human comprehension, and exploiting different forms of disfigured and deranged faces compelled me to keep watching. It was disturbing but quite poetic in the way De Sagazan expressed himself, especially when he adds more paint to create more unsettling images. Researching through some of De Sagazan’s art work, his style seems to represent themes of torture, occult, voodoo and combinations of other ancient cultural art forms. I find it intriguing the idea of how the changing of identity and transformation has such a profound impact on audiences, especially me. This is something that most people are scared of too as their identities belong to themselves and when you are unsure of change, you are often frightened of it happening.

I then began to question a few things:

Do we know exactly who we are?

Are we still trying to find out who we are? What happens if we have a revelation about ourselves?

Do we then spiritually/emotionally transform?

Does this then affect our perspectives and future?

Written by Jordan Tallis, Edited by Demi Morrison

This entry was posted in Demi Morrison, Jordan Tallis, Research. Bookmark the permalink.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *