Gemma Marmalade.

GEMMA MARMALADE.

Strange Birds.

 

Gemma Marmalade's installation work is based on an experiment that took place in 1957, where parapsychologists discovered that pigeons where able to indicate the sexuality of humans just by looking at them, in response Marmalade's work demonstrates this experiment.

Her work has incorporated historical, humour and a nature aspect, reviewing the history of science and the nature of bird's behaviour, which may be humorous to some as just through a initial judgement from a bird it is able to determine whether a person is gay or not.

From Marmalade's work I have learnt that immediate judgements can be made on a initial sighting, which challenges the perception of sexuality. I feel that her work bases inspirations around identifying sexuality and homophobic issues. These issues are communicated through using images of, for example, a diagram of a the humans visual field, in the slide show to incorporate the idea of perception. The main image in the slide show is a woman sat on a chair facing a pigeon which is on a table, the image supports the instructions made within the video. The use of black and white acknowledges the subjects to be the main focus, allowing the message within this piece to stand out, and demonstrate the pigeon identifying the woman's sexuality.