Ah, Handhelds -
The beauty of these works is that it breaks the boundary of what a stopmotion is intended to be. Whenever I tell people I am a stopmotion artist, the first comment is that it is always so time intensive. But, like most things, we can choose how much time we want to put into it.
I have been a sculptor all my life, starting with clay and ranging into wood, metal, mixed media, and found materials, all through college.
And then in the March of my junioryear, we were all sent home.
Stopmotions are something I picked up in the first Covid pandemic. While I had much less space to create the large sculptures I wanted to, I thankfully had an abundance of time. I learned the medium, understood the process, played, and focused on these during my senior year of college. After college, I redirected into wood carving. While I loved that era of my life, it was debilitating to my physical health, and it took far too much time. I worked on a few stopmotions, and then I got my job in NYC. Then the challenge became one of managing schedules.
The first time I went on the train to make a handheld, there were a few things I was worried about - would this be disruptive to people’s commute? would this make people uncomfortable? what would people think? I had to tunnel vision on my pieces as I made them to avoid those thoughts. I was driven more by the goal than the environment, and I was really hoping none of my worries would come to fruition.
After taking these transits for a year now, I kinda realized that people don’t really care about their surroundings in the train as long as its quiet and not disturbing. Some people have glanced over, and once someone even said they thought that what I was doing was very cool. But nobody has been annoyed about it. I’m still unsure about people’s comfort. In these frames, parts of people’s bodies are visible. I don’t takepictures if something is identifying on a person - usually tattoos, or if there is body scarring. Again, nobody has said anything, but it still feels strange sometimes. I’ve seen the insides of too many grocery bags. It’s so easy for pictures to circulate online, and I don’t want to be one sharing another’s personal info.
If anything the most stressful part has been seeing how police monitor the trains. I am Iranian, and I was born in the states. Seeing a brown man play with a suspicious gray material can be kind of unsettling. I’ve seen islamophobia all around me, and I am usually bracing myself for it when I’m doing these animations. I’ve left protests for Palestinian Liberation more stressed from the commute home than the actual marches, as I’m just expecting the cops to do something beyond uncalled for. It hasn’t happened yet, but I know that police only escalate whatever it is they deem as an issue. Its sad knowing the trains I make art in are the same ones people can be killed in by the police.
It has inspired hope for me though. I can retake the time lost in my commute into something that means something to me. I don’t have to stare into the wall or at my phone. I can work on my craft, and share my results with the world. What I thought was hours lost to capitalist pursuit became a haven for my art practice. Public transit really is a blessing when it is safe, and I am glad to be able to understand what I can do on the trains here.
Breaking these little boundaries can make us limitless.
As an artist, we can show people what is possible. I’ve seen people remaking these handhelds and it has been such a thrill seeing others take creativity into their own hands. We have many rules and understandings of life that can change immensely by only changing one thing. There are so many potential futures we have, and we can only get there by moving forward. I hope that by opening a door, generations can move through it.
omg i finished my newsletter yayyy and I have an announcement too omg
HANDHELDS - A ZINE, BY RAZ DOES ART AKA MEEEEEEE
Coming to yall later this month, expect a solid flipbook, and a compilation of some curated newsletters (*gulp*) and compositions of most of my stopmotions. get hyped fr.
na ily fr this zine turned from a fun little thing to a whole project we out here tho
much love,
Faraz
ps Omg I also went to art basel too Untitle Art Fair was crazy lemme add some stuff
pss i also fucked up and forgot some days for handhelds oopsies xoxo
pssssss i rly thought I could get a short film done by end of year but that aint happening yall stay bless tho xoxo
YUPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPP
thats all i have fr gm yall