What is my work about?
I am forever in search of community, not as an artist but as someone who wants to belong. I am an obsessive observer of the needs, identities, personalities, particularities, and outliers of communities, and how members are perceived by outsiders. My work brings me to the threshold of the art world and these communities, where I serve as a material translator. In my recent projects, I weave in and out of the doll fetish and marine mammal activist communities, exploring plastic capacities for synthesis and salvation, and the promise of the copy. In 2012, I began a series of alchemic performances turning life-like silicone sex dolls into models of captive whales while deepening my practice of online community participation.
Artist Statement
I am forever in search of community, not as an artist but as someone who wants to belong. I have become an obsessive observer of their needs, identities, personalities, particularities, and outliers, and how members are perceived by outsiders. My work brings me to the threshold of the art world and these groups, where I serve as a material translator. In my recent projects, I weave in and out of the doll fetish and marine mammal activist communities, exploring plastic capacities for synthesis and salvation, and the promise of the copy.
I have been a part of the doll community since 2005, when I acknowledged my failed attempts to date “organic” women and developed an affinity with “doll husbands” who consider dolls to be life partners. My participation began with the creation of Amber Doll, a sex doll made in my likeness using a digital scan of my head. Amber Doll was my artistic and romantic companion for the years between 2006-11. During that time our life was a collaborative performance—the beginning of the Amber Doll Project—that questioned the role of the surrogate and dynamics of desire. We presented our quotidian and staged output in various outlets including in online doll husband forums and interactive exhibitions.
In 2011, media coverage about a bull orca named Tilikum, who lives in captivity at SeaWorld Orlando and has been involved in three human deaths, opened a way for me to explore trans-species theory and fetishism: its spectacle and transgressions. In response, I transmogrified Amber Doll into a replica of Tilikum in Amber Doll > TILIKUM (Worksample 8) in the first of what has become my alchemic performances turning lifelike silicone sex dolls into models of captive whales. The performance drew an online audience of 33,000.
A subsequent installation, All That is Left of You / Everything You Are Now (Worksample 7, 2012), displayed the 556 non-orca parts of Amber Doll and invited viewers to observe these material vestiges of her body encased in plexiglass vitrines. In my current Letters to Pieces (Worksamples 5-6), I am writing letters to every piece of Amber Doll left over from her transformation. After pairing pieces with letters, I will be matching each set with an image from the now nearly decade-long Amber Doll Project, which continues to explore the ways we remain linked after her transformation.
In 2013, I continued my series of performance-transformations with Sidore (Mark II) / Heather > LOLITA (Worksamples 1-3), a six-day 70-hour livestreamed performance and corresponding video installation. I dismantled two donated RealDolls and combined their bodies into a replica of Lolita, the oldest orca in captivity—named after the protagonist of Nabokov’s novel—for an online audience of 47,000. The project was commissioned and made possible by each doll’s longtime partner: synthetics advocate and doll husband Davecat, and doll owner Jesse. LOLITA cast a glaring light on the problematic fluidity between the perception of a seductive body and the body in undeniable captivity—marking a body as “seductive” to erase its “captive” status. In addition to reacting against the brutality of Lolita’s long-term confinement and exploitation, the project poses broader feminist questions about surrogacy, domination, and enclosure via the suture of doll, female, and whale bodies. During the performance, Davecat read from Lolita and Jesse described the secret room he built to house Heather for 15 years. Other members of the doll and marine mammal activist community also participated remotely. Each of these narrations was integral to my reconstruction. The collaborations that comprised LOLITA became a vehicle of discursive engagement for members of the doll community who had not pursued public self-representation.
My new project FIVE DOLLS (Worksample 4) will build upon LOLITA by deepening and expanding participation between art and doll communities, and will change my role within the doll cyber community from that of fellow doll owner to doll object. FIVE DOLLS will be dually a performance and an online experience. It responds to the high volume of requests for Amber Doll by members of the doll community, even though she has never been a commercial product. Rather than licensing Amber Dolls for purchase, I will commission five more dolls in my current likeness. These will be assigned to five locations around the world corresponding to places with highest recorded online engagement with the Amber Doll Project and from which I have received the most requests for Amber Dolls. One participant from each location, which will be selected after an application and review process, will own an Amber Doll for one year. During this time, they will participate in a social media website designed specifically for the project by uploading images/videos to profile pages. They will also join me online for loosely choreographed performances (for example, participants will brush Amber Doll’s hair while I brush my own). At the conclusion one year, my FIVE DOLLS project will culminate in an installation of the dolls alongside photographs, videos, texts and performances. In “owning” me by proxy of their relationships with Amber Dolls, the participants of FIVE DOLLS will alter the narrative and the intimate relationship I established with my original Amber Doll.
CV
Education
2012
Skowhegan School of Painting & Sculpture, Maine
2006
School of the Art Institute of Chicago, Master of Fine Arts, Studio Arts
Selected Performances/Exhibitions/Screenings/Projects
2014
Hawk Swanson, Amber. All That is Left of You / Everything You Are Now. Women and Performance: A Journal of Feminist Theory (Routledge) Volume 23 Issue 3, November 2013: 374-413. (corresponding solo web project, forthcoming)
The Auction, Watermill Center, Water Mills, NY (solo performance & exhibition)
Feminist Media Festival, Brown University, Providence, RI (group screening)
The Participants, Denny Gallery, New York, NY (group exhibition)
Sidore Mark II / Heather > LOLITA, LMCC Workspace Residency, New York, NY (solo performance and Livestream)
2013
Amber Doll > Tilikum (36 Hour Edit), Souvenirs from Earth, opening event at Palais de Tokyo, Paris, France; Cable Broadcast in France and Germany (solo screening)
2012
Dallas Biennial (db12), Online + Oliver Francis Gallery, Dallas, TX (group exhibition)
VIDEO 2012, Momenta Art, Brooklyn, NY (group exhibition and screening)
All That is Left of You / Everything You Are Now, BOLT Gallery, Chicago, IL (solo
exhibition and performance)
Online Comments+CrossFit, Arlington Arts Center, VA (solo performance)
2011
Aftermath, BOLT Gallery, Chicago, IL (solo performance Online Comments in
conjunction with group exhibition)
Amber Doll > TILIKUM, BOLT Residency, Chicago, IL (solo performance and
Livestream)
Do Me, Invisible Dog and Spectacle Theatre, Brooklyn, NY (group screening)
2010-09
Losing Yourself in the 21st Century, Welch School Gallery, Georgia State University, Atlanta, GA; Maryland Art Place, Baltimore, MD (group exhibition)
2009
Artist Run Chicago, Hyde Park Art Center, Chicago, IL (group exhibition)
2008
To Have, To Hold, and To Violate: Amber and Doll, Locust Projects Gallery, Miami, FL (solo exhibition)
2007
Queer Territories, Latitude 53 Gallery, Edmonton, Alberta, Canada (group exhibition)
2006
Reeling: 25th Annual Lesbian & Gay International Film Festival, Chicago, IL (group screening)
Residencies/Grants/Fellowships
2014-15
Marie Walsh Sharpe Space Residency Program, New York, NY (forthcoming)
2014
Watermill Center Residency, Water Mills, NY (forthcoming)
Franklin Furnace Fund Grant, New York, NY
Yaddo Residency & Felowship, Saratoga Springs, NY
2013-2014
Lower Manhattan Cultural Council (LMCC) Workspace Residency, New York, NY
2013
MacDowell Colony Residency & Fellowship, Peterborough, NH
Atlantic Center for the Arts (guest curator Coco Fusco) on Joan Mitchell
Foundation Scholarship, New Smyrna Beach, FL
François Schneider Foundation Artist Grant Finalist, Wattwiller, France
2011-2012
Chicago Artist Coalition, BOLT Residency, Chicago, IL
2011
Woodstock Byrdcliffe, Byrdcliffe Artist in Residence Program, New York, NY
2010-2011
Elizabeth Foundation for the Arts Residency for NYC Arts Workers, New York, NY
2008
Fountainhead Residency in conjunction with Locust Projects, Miami, FL
Vermont Studio Center Residency on Scholarship, Johnson, VT
2008 & 2007
City of Chicago Community Arts Assistanceship Program Grant, Chicago, IL
Selected Bibliography
“Rodríguez, Juana María. “Viscous Pleasures & Unruly Feminisms,” GLQ: A Journal of Lesbian & Gay Studies 20.4 Fall 2014.
Smith, Marquard. “The Erotic Doll.” London: University of Westminster, Yale University Press, 2014.
Getsy, David. “Acts of Stillness: Statues, Performativity, and Critical Passivity.” Criticism 56.1 Jan. 2014.
Getsy, David. “Queer Exercises: Amber Hawk Swanson’s Performances of Self-Realization.” GLQ: A Journal of Lesbian & Gay Studies 19.4 Fall 2013.
Hernandez, Jillian. “Meditations on the Multiple: On Plural Subjectivity and Gender in Recent New Media Art.” Lateral Jul. 2013.
Watkins Fisher, Anna. “Like a Girl’s Name: The Adolescent Drag of Amber Hawk Swanson, Kate Gilmore, & Ann Liv Young.” The Drama Review (MIT Press) Spring 2012: 48-76.
“Ustreaming Of Sex-Doll-Turned-Orca-Whale Censored.” Huffington Post 13 Dec. 2011. Web.
Vartanian, Hrag. “Performance Artist Censored & Banned on Ustream Because of Doll Nudity.” Hyperallergic 12 Dec. 2011.
Waxman, Lori. “Aftermath’ group show.” Chicago Tribune 17 Nov. 2011.
Dawn Whitney, Jennifer. “Beyond Fake’: Real Dolls(TM) and Posthuman Troubling of Femininity and Desire.” Assuming Gender Spring 2010.
Brit Shapiro, Daria. “Pleased to Meet Me.” Map Magazine Jun. 2008: 70-71.
Cohen, Sandy. “Lars movie shines light on RealDolls.” Associated Press
17-19 Oct. 2007. (serial)
“Anatomy of a Punch: Re:Sound Program” Chicago Public Radio Apr. 2007. (radio)
Selected Lectures / Panels / Gallery Talks
2014
Visiting Artist Lecture Series, Columbia University, New York City, NY
]performance space[, London, UK
New York University’s Tisch School of the Arts, New York City, NY
2013
Parsons, The New School, New York City, NY
2012
Syracuse University, London, UK
School of the Art Institute of Chicago, IL
DePaul University, Chicago, IL
Harold Washington, Chicago, IL
School of Visual Arts, New York City, NY
#ArtsTech Panel for NYC Social Media Week, New York City, NY
VIDEO 2012 Panel, Momenta Art, Brooklyn, NY
2011
Keynote Address for (Dis)embodied Feminisms: New Perspectives on Gender,
Sexuality & Identity Conference, McGill University, Montreal, Quebec, Canada
2009
Visiting Artist Series, East Carolina University, Greenville, NC
MFA Visiting Artist Series, Hunter College, New York City, NY
Emily Hall Tremaine Foundation Fall 2009 Board Meeting, Yale University, CT
Society for Photographic Education Conference, Montclair, NJ
Video Symposium, School of Visual Arts, New York City, NY
Fashion Institute of Technology, Photography Department, New York City, NY
2008
Private Opening Lecture Event, Locust Projects Gallery, Miami, FL
2007
Visiting Emerging Artist Program, Beloit College, Beloit, WI
2006
Feminism and Gender Identity Panel, Reeling Festival and The Institute for the
Study of Women and Gender in the Arts and Media, Chicago, IL
“Sidore (Mark II) / Heather > LOLITA” (10minute Compilation from 70hour Performance)
FIVE DOLLS Face Scan, 2013