tracking precocious puberty and obesity
http://www.newscientist.com/article.ns?id=dn12048&feedId=online-news_rss20
the big pharma companies
Obesity pill increases suicidal thoughts
17:30 12 June 2007
NewScientist.com news service
New Scientist and Reuters

TITLE:The story never stops beginning or ending. It appears in continuity headless and bottomless for it is built on daily differences. Its (in)finite subverts every notion of completeness. yet there is a structure, there is a point but entry can be from any point and there can be no return.

Abstract;
war sounds
http://www.partnersinrhyme.com/soundfx/warsounds.shtml

illegal alien

http://www.todaystmj4.com/news/local/7586027.html

Deputy Murder Suspect Has Long Criminal History

Rob Lowry

KENOSHA - The man now charged with killing Kenosha County Sheriff's Deputy Frank Fabiano is an illegal immigrant with a long criminal record.

http://www.blogcatalog.com/post-tag/immigration%20reform

TiTLE: "Illegal migration is big business in this part of the world and there is good money to be made guiding hopefuls over the desert"

ABstract

Title: connecting a history

Abstract: working with an artist in the production of an interactive at piece - myself helping with the technology the subject of my PP project became the topic, At firat he didn't really understand the projecting of the kids on the pesticides n home depot but thought there might be a connection especially as the children's were taking about puberty but there were no people to see it - it seemed pretty isolated and then he saw me walking through the isles, talking with blacks and hipanics who stopped and viewed and chatted they were obviously getting an individualised experience in public.
he was impressed by the apparatus that I had made to project the video and did not get the radio connection. I then spent time explaining the individual use and history of the radio and how today we use the radio as a personal tool the way of tuning the radio and the reference to the radio as a mediated space where I have created a radio station that is not regulated by the government. He then said that the guy Wjkorket - who uses the site specific places such as huge buildings for the project as a reference point on which t project his images but both the images and the location were representative. but the projects are very different Wjzork is working on the semiotic representations of both the projected image and the actual building i.e a government building yet min project was very specifically targeting those that created the imagined person.

He had seen the video of the large projections of on the oil rigs and wondered if people actually participated - and as we had found out and potentionally thought as an extension. people could stop in their cars and tune into the sound on their radios. He then related it to his own work where he would put up billboard photographs as a form of intervention. The viewer only got an understanding if they saw him gluing it down and they could ask him what he was doing. Other than that it would just be up to them to interpret. But he would sit back and just watch people reactions from a park bench across the road. Todd Gray

We also rewrote an application for UCHRI in New York

Guerilla projections

> My artwork focuses on the apparent remoteness and disconnect between
food production and consumption. By using everyday digital products
(available over the counter) I have created a low cost projector to show
videos in
public spaces such as food chain stores, in hospital corridors, where the
passerby can stumble across them. I am taking the message to the masses.
With playful interactivity inspired through technology, I generate a place
where the linking of meanings is hidden and codified in a dynamic form of
public agency for the individual. Using new
> media and technology as a form of mediation and language as my point of
> departure (i.e. the medical term "precocious puberty".) My
> questions are: Can the immersive use of  art activism and technology in
public places provide a space for individuals who normally have little
or no access to medical/science education be informed?
>
>June 14th awillcoc@uci.edu

or no access to medical/science education be informed?
>
>
>
> -Pearl  how is this

angela
>
>
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: <awillcoc@uci.edu>
> To: "Pearl Ho" <hop@uci.edu>
> Sent: Tuesday, June 12, 2007 1:32 PM
> Subject: Re: ucira
>
>
>> absolutely
>> what do we need to do
>>
>> angela
>>
>

title: the reason

Abstract:
Through my artwork I will argue and demonstrate by way of visualisation and interactivity, in public and private spaces, that we are being deliberately manipulated both consciously and unconsciously by the purveyors of language and implementaers of media and technology

I went to the long beach artist walk and projected in galleries and on walls
ran into a young health worker interested in the project for working with youth at risk. This project was offering an alternate interactive environment that could catch their attention. I was projecting before the female fire eating belly dancers.

in an art gallery I was projecting on the ceiling and floors people stopped and as about the children but I was also grilled about the fact that they had seen it outside and maybe people could not understand it, was that part of my intent and by straddling both art and information a great linking

TITLE:
In defense of my project_evidence of knowledge_more than art

ABSTRACT:
The contemporary artist is a culture maker.1. Academic writing is writing done by scholars for other scholars. 2 The art of the academic paper is no longer just for the scholarly elite and should not be limited to the old idealized formats that are consistently used though out most disciplines in the American University System. By writing this paper as a blog I am proposing that the changes in knowledge production due to the technological revolution has created a chasm between knowledge production and knowledge dissemination. My Blog formed through networking and hyper-linking is not a solution for all disciplines but a relevant practice that proves my scholarship within the ACE program. The presence of New forms of Media literacy (Wikki), the nature of interdisciplinary (MIT) studies in the Sciences (site Cal it2), Computation (open source, site paper) and the Humanities (site UCHRI last summer) and the merging of research with commerce in the university system requires new formats and ways of authorship. I have created a bit of evidence, a space in the academic world where there is a possibility for rethinking. Rethinking the way we validate and give authorship to the scholarly production of knowledge. My paper, blog, is a performance, an artwork, an academic paper and a viable source of academic knowledge.

To: pumpkin@mindspring.com
Subject: response to PP
Date: Jun 1, 2007 12:01 PM

Angela remember when we went out for the first showing, there were a number of people who were intrigued. People in cars stopped at the corner stoplight would roll down their windows to get a better look, and asked what we were doing. A group of twenty-somethings in the parking lot across the street yelled questions to you and came closer to see what the video was about.

I saw the video I took on Myspace that showed the performance piece. The idea of taking art to the people, taking it off the gallery walls where it maintains a certain distance from everyday life, is very refreshing. People who would not necessarily walk into a gallery or a museum were invited to listen and view the piece in common, every day locations. I think the shock of having art brought to you probably made people remember the work more strongly than if they had gone to see it in a context that was not relevant to the work. It was out of context for most viewers, - seeing an art project in public but in context with the content of the art work, and that made it memorable. By going mobile, Angela you also able to make the piece more flexible. Instead of a blank screen or white wall, your video was projected on a myriad of different, contextual "screens", Those screens could be changed at will, which then altered the context of the video itself, so every performance was new and different.


That's all I got. 8^)
Laura


Bibliography

1. Sharon Hayes. Visiting Artist UCI April 24Th-26Th 2007


2. Writing at Dartmouth Online Writing Materials Materials for Students
What is an academic paper?
http://www.dartmouth.edu/~writing/materials/student/ac_paper/what.shtml

TITLE:
The technology of art: the imagined

ABSTRACT;
The process of art is often perceived as a free, democratic practice that is cutting edge, progressive and experimental. (Paco Barragan) The making of the artist, is a manufactured position, steeped in the traditions of institutions, mediated by history and technology, defined by those in the positions of authority, (Bretcht) that are embedded into the already existing systems of art production. I believe Art today is simply a place where the art of recycling and connecting facilitates the process of reinvention, where the marginalized are creating anew. (Larkin)
(Hausa video) (Youtube video)

INTRODUCTION:
Networked connections:
The connections between my process of art practice, my production of knowledge, use of technology and my life at home overlap, imposing onto and impregnating each other endlessly, often without my consciousness decision. For example; my children also become my muses when I want to visualize an idea. the way I hypothesize, sketch and create solutions for my art projects is very similar to the way I jot notes, plan, write and research a paper. Presently Language is the same starting point for my academic and artistic work. The finding and exploring of the words Precocious Puberty which is used to identify the disease, came from videoing children as much as doing my academic research. (pics)

The word precocious officially means:
1. unusually advanced or mature in development, esp. mental development; a precocious child
2. prematurely developed, as the mind, faculties, etc
3. of or pertaining to premature development
4. Botany: a. flowering, fruiting, or ripening early, as plants or fruit
b. bearing blossoms before leaves, as plants
c. appearing before leaves, as flowers
Origin: 1640–50; L praecoci-, s. of praecox (2.)

(show pics of sexy girls)

Although there is an 'official' meaning allocated to the word precocious, when I interviewed people, asking what their definition of the word was, it became evident that not only was there a vast range in meaning, but that the majority of those interviewed had an alternate understanding, an unoffical version. Precocious, had become a negative term was used to describe the child as naughty, excessive or rude, the meaning had transformed into a flawed behavioral characteristic. This simple exercise, where people were asked to define a the word such as precocious brought to my attention to the fact that adults also used words like "bubs, blooming and flowering", only when describing the puberty of a girl. Creating a problematic imagined image of the precocious Puberty child owning the disease. (Appanduri**)

graph link to PDF

Young girls seemed to own of the disease of early puberty not only because of the misunderstood naming but by the use of language that describes the process of puberty. Mix the language, with the bombardment of sexy images of the girl in advertising and the girls early puberty can be seen as natural. and these connections add up creating a wall which detracts from the need for finding a cause. (Jezebel theory) (site article showing PP in news) (show young sexy girl)







But the use of language is not the only frustrating factor, there are many connectors. In the past few years PP is simply seen as a bi-product of Americas problem with Obesity. Obesity, the new disease of the new century. (site an article in NY times around obesity) Obesity means fat and fat promotes estrogen and research shows that an increase in estrogen means early puberty. (site research) If you have increased estrogen then you need a product to counteract the effects of production of estrogen. The big Pharma companies then need to to create a new product that either curtails eating or prohibits the making of estrogen. Big Pharma then supports or creates facilities for research. in institutions such as hospitals, insurance companies, universities.(give link)
(show fat pills) (show lipo suction)

But is it that simple? This one scenario of placing obesity in the context of the manufacture of technology, the production of knowledge and promotion through new media, Obesity becomes a tool in the manufacture of commodities and profits. There is also the issue of steroids in food produced through the production of chicken and meat , phaliates that are found in plastics,(Dominican Republic) or the use of pesticides needed to produce fruit and vegetables in colossal quantities throughout the world or genetic. The connections and list of causes becomes endless and inconclusive, which has impacted the way I approached the meshing of sound and visuals for my project and the use of a blog that I can edit endlessly.

show cows and chickens

To: awillcocks
Subject: Video response
Date: Jun 5, 2007 7:59 AM

I tried three times to open the site on two different web browsers with the precise site that you sent me. Each time the site address reverted to just www.myspace.com, the general home page, and I didn't know where to go from there.
So I went back to the former guerrilla projections you sent before. As I said, the sound quality is too low and poor to really know what is being talked about so I just watched the video several times.

What I find most interesting is how appropriate the selected form of
presentation is to the concept of the piece. That is to say, unexpected and unannounced. To use this very mobile, guerrilla-style manner of projecting images onto chosen commercial and industrial sites is intriguing and gives a much deeper meaning to this insidious topic of far reaching implications.
This manner of presentation speaks very succinctly to the over arching toxicity that pervades this society's lifestyles on so many levels and the myriad spheres of life that it impacts. Using seemingly random businesses such as a pharmacy/health clinic, a building supply depot, and a water tower near a working oil rig to project images onto neatly comments on the benign/not-so-benign sources by which we may be potentially poisoning ourselves and our children. This style of work reminds me of a Michael Moore sensibility.

I have to remark, however, the garbled sound did not further the intent and in fact added confusion in this instance. The initial montage of people talking in a shopping aisle was also confusing but the images of a child with the number 9 projected next to an oil rig was very compelling. And I found the artist statement very helpful to read prior to viewing the video.
This is a very relevant and topical issue to pursue and I would like to see this idea and approach explored further . The quieter, stiller images communicate better however.

Leslie

The technology of the process:
My blog is up and running and today was panel day where the ACE graduating students presented and proposed theories and practice around the forming of our projects, another context for my work: Version 5. This performance or panel, where my images were downloaded through a web browser and documented on video, with me describing my project, yet another piece of evidence necessary for my proof of project. (link to UCI WEB) The act of re-documenting recycles. (Larkin) By showing my work through the Internet as I spoke, I was in a sense demonstrating the difference between actual experience and a mediated experience. I staged my talk as a performance where knowledge production and art were mashed though technology.

Technology provides all these different avenues and paths that add t and can unravel mysteries. Technology can bring a sense of truth to many of different types of people while facilitating the flow of information, translating, reconfiguring, transforming and informing. The actual experience of the site specific installation (projection and transmission) is intended to be a personal interactive experience that creates a situated event. Unlike the digital translation (video) or the staged demonstration in a gallery presentation which are not about the site, the situated or the situatedness (Appadurai), the mediation/showing of the project through documentation and presentations is beneficial to prove knowledge and practice but the crucial part of the Art is the actual performance where people respond to the physicality of the experience and a crack is created that can initiate dialog. (It is very hard to compete against the ramped corporate New Media)

"Technologies, being the apparatuses that are used to collect, organize, compute and translate information.
they have become the mechanisms and infrastructure for distributing messages, interacting with the worlds that facilitate the way in which we are meant to respond. (Dourish 2006)" My project, a portable video projector with radio transmission is formulated around the idea that technology enables me to create a space where the identity of the imagined subject can be translated onto an existing public space. The traditional public space (outside the home) is is a space that is inhabited by the presence of individuals doing there own thing. I am intervening in their space and the fact that i am recycling and reusing technology that they are familiar with abstracts and re-mediates the imagined child providing a new place for new interpretations. (site Dourish article about playing game in public) By creating a space where the face of the imagined child can be visualized, solidified by the video I am also situating the child,as a participant not just a victim. This new use of technology opens up the possibilities for inherent flexibilities, which can transform, translate and transport ideas, policies, people and knowledge..

This engagement of contextual space through performance and technology provides a real experience that can impact the everyday, the normative and redirect discourse (de Certeau) . Perhaps this is why we need to look to new Media as a viable format for knowledge production.


Notes:
Official - meaning authorized by a proper authority. an testament, a court document

Mediation: mediating meanings,
It is the way we are enabled to understand our environment and this in turn affects how we decode, interpret and interact with our worlds. (Bestor ) For example the radio waves are monitored by the government and large companies which regulate what gets played, what news we hear and it is their choice not ours. Freewave radio 99 point 3

The radio:
Radios as a form of evolving technology have developed along with the modern technology revolution, where their
discriminatory powers (transmission and receiver) are now similar to the highly evolved human
communication system, (communication interference is close to non-existent today so why are
they regulated?) The radio has been regulated since WW1 by standards and constraints, which
are now automatically built into the infrastructure of the hardware and software. Today the public
rarely questions the embedded nature of the control, seeming powerless or perhaps just
disinterested. ( transmission strength and specific wavelength usage are bought and sold by a
small number of corporations and organizations banning the amateur Radio user from distanced
communication and specific wave length usage, which directly affects what types of information
we receive and where). What we hear is mediated by those who own the airwaves and the radio
is just one of many examples where technology it is not only the distributor of information but a
material where the imagined is conceived and distributed. (Sussen 2006, 23)


Bibliography:

Barragan, Paco The Art to Come: 159 Artists 2001 Subastas siglo XX1, SL, Madrid

Larkin, Brian Degraded Images, Distorted Sounds: Nigerian Video and the Infrastructure of Piracy Public Culture16(2): 289–314 Copyright ©2004 by Duke University Press

2. American Psychological Association (APA):
precocious. (n.d.). Dictionary.com Unabridged (v 1.1). Retrieved June 06, 2007, from Dictionary.com website: http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/precocious

By ‘subject’ I do not imply only human actors. Rather, we refer to any agent – be it a human
being, a natural element or an artifact – involved in a process of creation of meaning. See Latour 1987;
Hayles 1999; Whatmore 2002

3. An interview with Arjun Appadurai by Annette Baldauf and Christian Hoeller. Translocation_new
media/ art Modernity at Large. https://www.translocation.at/appadurai “site, situation and situatedness are
of paramount importance in the globalized world... But we need to avoid assuming that sites are the
same as communities or that localities are simply geographical locations”

Appadurai, Arjun 1996. Modernity at Large: Cultural Dimensions of Globalization
(University of Minnesota University Press,
Appadurai discusses the use of the imagination and how it acts between how we imagine the world and
how that imagination influences our self-understanding, between social institutions and their effects on the
people who participate in them.


Cresswell, Tim 1999 Embodiment, Power and the Politics of Mobility: The Case of the Female
Tramp and Hobos Transactions of the Institute of British Geographers, New Series, Vol 24, No. 2.
The tramps identity was constructed through a number of discursive strategies. Definitions through
documentation – the anarchist Ben Ritman
Different to the average person, where the tramp was someone that traveled on a train. The tramps
identity was created through newspaper articles describing biased accounts of individuals “as well as appearing in editorials and learned paper, the tramp was a favorite figure for cartoonists and illustrators.
He appeared to be either a foolish clown of a hostile threat...placing him at the boundary of the home
usually occupied by a mother” p182
The Imagined Image was further defined by laws, tramp laws where the existence of tramps was
understood (over time) in terms of “schemes of perception” p183

de Certeau, Michel translated by Steven F. Rendall. 1984. The Practice of everyday life.,
University of California Press, pp34-35

Dourish Paul, Bell, Genevieve, 2006 The Infrastructure of Experience and the Experience of
Infrastructure:Meaning and Structure in Everyday Encounters with Space

McLuhan, Marshall 1967 Medium is the message 1st Ed.: The Vanguard Press, NY; reissued by
Gingko Press, 2002

TITLE:
Art_Performing research_Proof of Project.

ABSTRACT:
Simply Art or is it a 'bounded object' (Latour) that connects the networked path, from the 'production of knowledge', through the construction of meaning, to the cementing of power within the institution of knowledge?

a bounded object activism

My project could be seen as a walk, a serious activist intervention, a graduate requirement for the Graduate ACE program or a post postmodern Art practice. By using an art piece I have researched and developed a titled Precocious Puberty that demonstrates my on going investigation of Language, Language as a kind of avatar, as a targeted mediator. The video art and radio transmission pieces that form part of this project are conceptually relevant and crucial to appreciating the Art. You will see how I have informed the public of three structured walks proposed as part of this project and then documented these performance pieces on Myspace, current TV, Youtube and on my own personal web site. The simplicity of small children interpreting words becomes more complex when mapped onto a tower, and heard though radio demonstrates the impact of language through multiple and concurrent use of ramped-up technology and new media. Everyone has an opinion, right? How much art is in the delivery?

On May 26, 2007, at 8:48 AM, awillcoc@uci.edu wrote:

> Here are a few videos take a look - my project
>
> http://www.myspace.com/fatsothedidileo
>
> angela


On May 28, 2007, at 10:32 PM,:

Hi Angela,
I am terribly sorry I couldn't attend your performance last night, but I am in the last
week of a yoga teacher training certification and couldn't miss class last night. (no I am not kidding, I am becoming a California New Age
woman...).I would have loved to see your actual project rather than documentation, but since this wasn't  possible it would be really
helpful if I could hear you talk/present the project before your actual thesis defense.

let me know if that works for you, otherwise maybe we can schedule a meeting where you can tell me all
about it. (I am leaving town right after classes end though).

all the best,
Beatriz
>
Beatriz da Costa
Assistant Professor of Studio Art, Electrical Engineering and Computer Science
Arts Computation Engineering (ACE) Graduate Program University of California, Irvine

www.beatrizdacosta.net
www.preemptivemedia.net

INTRODUCTION:
The Inspiration: I have been documenting my children (Diego and Raphael) for the past 5 years, as they learnt how to speak, write, read, interpret and use the American English Language. Language is an essential unit of my children's education as they create an understanding of their world. Over time my children's use words has become a tool for the flow of information, communicating and understanding, processing and acting and interacting. Through examination, research data collection and documentation the construction of language has been dissected beyond the superficiality of observation (site some language research) My observations, although not scientific in technique, are the biased lens of a mother and artist. Overtime my children learned to interpret and use words and this has influenced the way they interact socially. Their use of language has begun to define their beliefs, fabricate truth or fantasy carried their emotions and imagined ideas. As my small children weave their way through life, the gradual accumulation of language serves to increase their knowledge. This is an accepted fact. But at what point is the getting of this knowledge bound by “rules” manufactured and imposed on our language so that in the act of communication we perceive what “they” want us to perceive?
school local store hospital

Whether or not the children were in total control of the language uses and terminologies they were being constantly bombarded by different information. Through documenting my children's progress I noticed that factors outside the home were influencing the way my children used their words and understood situations. New Media such as TV, web, radios Mp3's, video games and film as well as schools, institutions (hospitals) or simply a journey to the local store fueled gave new a meaning and context. Over time those in the positions of authority, the parent, the mentor, the teacher, the sibling, the shop keeper all influenced my children's view of the world the words had become 'bounded objects'. bounded by and through technology.(McLuhan) (Latour).

To:	pumpkin@mindspring.com
Subject:	RE: angela wilcocks
Date:	May 24, 2007 9:54 PM

Had a look at the videos Ange, took me a little while to work the projection one out but it is quite interesting, I like seeing the kids again.

Mark



At the same time I was documenting my children, I was a student working with a group of women at ACE. We were researching a common a obsession, food; food production, consumption and classification. I noticed early on, that I paid little attention to the food I fed my children and didn't really care if this impacted them. I had control over what they ate but essentially the cost determined what food they got. After lots of discussions, meetings and research I noticed the different types of language used, such as Organic, general merchandise, generic, genetic and particularly precocious puberty. Precocious Puberty is the medical term for a disease that is perhaps linked to a child's consumption of food, I misinterpreted it as a naughty kids problem, why? Some how the placing of these two words together make me think the child became the problem. Coincidently a friend emailed me today

To:	pumpkin@mindspring.com
Subject:	virtuality in art?
Date:	Jun 4, 2007 12:13 AM

I mentioned PP to a doctor I know earlier today and he said “mention PP to a doctor and we immediately know what it means. There is only one meaning for Precocious and that is early. Look at the word, it comes from pre – meaning before and corpus meaning body. The medical jargon has only one meaning. It is when it gets out in the media that this title gets overtaken by several judgmental, sexualized meanings that lead to a variety of perceptions.” I thought that was interesting.

For me even the fact these words imply that the child is gifted with the disease of Precocious Puberty is problematic. My first impression find connection between precocious puberty, food and the child? Researching the disease Precocious Puberty,formed my concept and ideas, directing the path of my interdisciplinary, technological project.(ACE) The connections with food, language and children was inevitable spilling from my Interdisciplinary studies into my home a classic. My children became my muses, they were my lab rats being exploited and documented as I processed the implications and artistic parameters surrounding Precocious Puberty.



The research:
The more I researched the disease Precocious Puberty, the more confused I became, the more complicated and ill-defined the problem became. I started off believing that it was probably caused by pesticides and steroids and remember thinking "when will I be able to afford organic food" Then while researching a paper for a Womens Studies presentation (and paper) the deeper I dug the more I discovered how little I understood of the disease I had become a Modest witness (Haraway). The medical research was problematic: a majority of doctors, scientists and writers consistently sited only one research paper as scientific their form of verification and qualification for the disease and the methodology appeared flawed.

‘Precocious Puberty’ is on the Rise By Kim Ridley, Ode. Posted January, 2007
Hormone-mimicking chemicals found in food, water, and many consumer goods may well be the cause of why children as young as eight are showing signs of sexual development…… Researchers call this phenomenon "precocious puberty," which some say is on the rise. Forty-eight percent of African-American girls and 15 percent of Caucasian girls show physical signs of puberty by age 8, according to a study of 17,000 U.S. girls published in Pediatrics in 1997. In a subsequent study of more than 2,000 boys, lead author Marcia Herman-Giddens found that 38 percent of African-American boys and 30 percent of Caucasian boys showed signs of sexual development by age 8.

Most of the statistics referred to by the medical, technical and news agencies essentially quoted 4 numbers, as a demarcation point for classifying the age for the early onset puberty (PP) 6 or 7 for black girls,7 for girls Latin ,8 white girls ,9,10 for boys. How accurate can these numbers be, when the research was done on 93'% white children with no consideration for their the socio economic background?

" METHODS: A cross-sectional study was conducted by 225 clinicians in pediatric practices belonging to Pediatric Research in Office Settings, a practice-based research network. After standardized training in the assessment of pubertal maturation, practitioners rated the level of sexual maturation on girls 3 through 12 years who were undergoing complete physical examinations. RESULTS: Data were analyzed for 17,077 girls, of whom 9.6% were African-American and 90.4% white. At age 3, 3% of African-American girls and 1% of white girls showed breast and/or pubic hair development, with proportions increasing to 27.2% and 6.7%, respectively, at 7 years of age. " (3)

Then on 22/5/07 A friend, Leslie called me from Atlanta. "Yes" she had received my e-mail about my projections in Long Beach. And "No" she would be unable to make the performance, but she had been thinking about me today. Leslie had been watching Oprah Winfrey’s show yesterday on TV yesterday when a member of the audience , a mother asked Dr Oz if it was normal for her 6 year old daughter to have breasts? Dr Oz was appreciative of the question, as this was a recent problem and had become important to him, it seemed to be occurring more and more in children today. Dr Oz named this early maturing as the disease Precocious Puberty and referred the problem to Oprah, asking her if she knew that 25% of African American children have Precocious Puberty? http://www.oprah.com. (Oprah archive 21/5/07)



I quickly hung up the phone, thinking how fortuitous it was that Oprah and my performance had occured on the same day. I logged immediately onto the internet, looking up Oprah’s web site to connect with Dr Oz. at least I can e-mail them.

To: "Oprah.com "
Subject: precocious puberty
Date: May 21, 2007 10:05 PM
I watched your program yesterday and found it extremely coincidental yet meant to be as I projecting my art piece – precocious puberty in public places
I am an artist and have been working the causes and effects of Precocious puberty for the past year.
I have created a portable projector with radio transmitter that enables me to walk the streets, malls and public spaces projecting my Art Work about Precocious Puberty.
Dr Oz was talking on your show in response to a parents worry about her daughters early puberty and I would suggest you take a look at my web site about this Precocious Puberty Problem.

http://www.awillcocks.com.PP.html.
Please feel free to contact me at any time
Angela willcocks

As an artist this could be my big break, the media, the news....the creating and building of interest in my work that will give me credibility. If Dr Oz, connects with me through my email, if he sees that I am interested in helping the public, he could be intrigued by my inventive art projections, then that could change my career, I could become a famous artist, all I need is that one piece of Media coverage legitimizing me. I can only imagine the chain reaction, the media, the galleries, the critics, the curators, the museums, the jobs possibilities, the universities. The fact is an artists reputation is built over time in the mediated space of the art world.



Being a successful Artist is a networked process, a process similar to the Academic. There are only a few ways to become an artist and culture maker. The most common paths are either being through the galleries, museums or the university system. All rely on the validation of the artist an artist that is reviewed in magazines, and books or mentioned in a Newspaper, becomes noticed. Take for example the heavily marketed Saatchi Collection exhibit, "Sensation: Young British Artists" 80% of the artist virtually all unknown now earn their living as Artists.

Chris Ofili christine Finn Van Gogh

Highlighted throughout history people such as Van Gogh or Frieda Kalo lived in poverty most of their lives, they had natural talent but where never recognized by the powers that control the Art world. The artist must take part in the production of their Art, the networking, the learning, the promoting and the selling, all necessary hurdles built by the structures within the framework of the Art World(Carter) For example Stelac the techno Australian a globally networked practicing artist.

To: pumpkin@mindspring.com
Subject: Oprah.com has received your e-mail
Date: May 22, 2007 12:05 PM

Dear angela Willcocks,

Thank you for your e-mail! Your message is important to us. Unfortunately, due
to the volume of e-mail messages we receive every day, we cannot guarantee that
you'll receive a personal response. Feel free to check out our Frequently Asked
Questions for additional help.
http://www.oprah.com/tows/program/tows_prog_main.jhtml

Thanks again for writing to us!

Sincerely,
The Oprah.com Staff
www.oprah.com

The promotion and the networking of the Artist is an essential key for success in the Art world today. It provides evidence of eminence. The artist must produce the work, but the connections that site, validate and display the artists work is powerful. The production of the artist is the same as the production of knowledge within the university system. It does not matter if it is the Activist artist who is supported by universities, grants and international conferences or the commercial artist supported in galleries, museums and corporate collections, the artist or academic need to be represented and both need media to highlight the importance of the artists career. Although there are several different ways to get noticed, the majority of aspiring artists follow specific paths. For example, firstly the 'high' artist (notes place definition of high and low art) needs a degree from a relevant university. The prospective artist has to be selected for a program under certain criteria by the Art Professors. Remember the Professors are artists employed by that institution and they build the reputation of the institution. The artists employed by the institutions are connected to galleries, curators and conferences that sell, display and promote their work. (Vehlmetta gallery +UCLA) The more important the university the more probability, you will be referred to prominent galleries or curators or conferences which in turn this validates your authenticity as an artist.

5/29/07
e-mail
Todd grey – UCLB

hey angela,

i saw you and your partner working at the home depot last tuesday. i kept a little distance in order to witness the interactions occurring around you, intending to greet you a short while later. i saw you speaking with a black couple across from the check-out area at depot, then went to get something from my car. when i returned i couldn't find you guys anywhere. looked all through depot, drove my car around the lot. i was only gone a couple of minutes. really wanted to observe more of the process. nice to see people putting on earphones and engaging.
best,
todd

As e-mails come and go I start to wonder how the idea of trying to promote yourself is not how the public sees the artist (Greenberg). Being an artist is like being a free spirit, someone who does not need to earn money because they are doing what they want. I then start to question my web site that I recently uploaded http://www.springmail.com/PP.html. Perhaps I need to change how the links go nowhere, maybe there needs to be more than just sound and a black square on some pages (all conceptual decisions demonstrating different parts of my research) The changes might compromise my Art Internet site, but the public will be able to follow the relationship between my hyper-linked pages. More clarity, less interpreting, more accessibility.

public forum public chat

All my Art is on the internet, open and accessible for public viewing. Our idea of the 'public' has changed from a place out of the house to a space created at home with access to the public. My thoughts project excitedly onto the fact that I might actually be able to get noticed. By posting my videos on the internet, I am not only proving my project for the university but I am opening up the possibility of having access for the public. Reflexively this New Media connection between private and public also promotes an artists practice .

To:	pumpkin@mindspring.com
Subject:	art again
Date:	My 24th , 2007 7:32 PM

hi angela,
just took a piece at the videos. like the guerilla stuff - the contraption that you where is really cool - love the performance aspect of it as well. it's hard to hear the audio inside the store - competes too much with the
audio in the video. oh yeah, the one that's projected on the water tower is really effective visually. i think scale makes a difference. i like the billboard conceptually, though the billboard imagery competes.

be well.
xo,
traci

Notes:

Bibliography:

Latour, Bruno (1987). Science In Action: How to Follow Scientists and Engineers Through Society, Harvard University Press, Cambridge Mass., USA.

‘Precocious Puberty’ is on the Rise By Kim Ridley, Ode. Posted January, 2007
http://www.alternet.org/environment/46213?page=1

KidsHealth > Parents > Medical Problems > Sexual & Reproductive System > Precocious Puberty
Puberty, usually occurring during adolescence, is when kids develop physically and emotionally into young men and women. Usually, this starts to happen no earlier than about 7 to 8 years of age for girls and 9 years of age for boys (the average age is about 10 for girls and 12 for boys).



3. Herman-Giddens ME, Slora EJ, Wasserman RC, Bourdony CJ, Bhapkar MV, Koch GG, Hasemeier CM.
Department of Maternal and Child Health, School of Public Health, University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill 27599-7580, USA. 1: Pediatrics. 1997 Apr;99(4):505-12
Secondary sexual characteristics and menses in young girls seen in office practice: a study from the Pediatric Research in Office Settings network. Pediatrics. 1997 Apr;99(4):505-12. PMID: 9093289 [PubMed - indexed for MEDLINE]


http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/sites/entrez

Herman-giddens is also quoted " that other factors, including girls growing up without their father in the home, lack of exercise, and endocrine disruptors – chemicals common in pesticides – could also be playing a role in the early onset of female puberty (see Why are girls growing up so fast?).

“It’s not normal,” Herman-Giddens says, “but with the growing obesity epidemic, the problem is likely to increase.”

Journal reference: Pediatrics (vol 119, issue 3)"

The Artist in the Modern World: A Conflict Between Market and Self-Expression - Review
Art Journal, Winter, 1998 by David Carrier

"But unless we understand how art is sold and promoted, how can we properly grasp its purely aesthetic qualities? Much of the effect of most recent U.S. art depends on its being presented in upscale galleries - and that would be impossible without the financial resources of successful dealers. "I hate being called an art dealer," one dealer once said to me. But without several generations of such gifted businesspeople, the U.S. art world could hardly exist."

Sensation: Young British Artists from the Saatchi Collection (Paperback) book (Paperback)
by Norman Rosenthal (Author), Brooks Adams (Author), Royal Academy of Arts (Great Britain) (Author), Saatchi Collection (Corporate Author)

Clement Greenberg: 1909 - 1994 An Influential twentieth century art critic, best known for his promotion and defense of abstract expressionism. In "Avant-Garde and Kitsch" (1939) he somewhat paradoxically combined his socialist convictions with a defense of avant-garde, abstract, "non-objective" painting and poetry, even while admitting that this art appealed to a small and shrinking elite, members of the ruling class, on whose money the avant-garde depended for its survival.