Tattoo of Spain: A Stop-Motion Animation

By Raven Watkins

_{(La romería de San Isidro), A Pilgrimage to San Isidro, 1820–1823, Francisco Goya}

Hello! My name is Raven Watkins, I am a third year student at Florida State University majoring in studio art with a focus in drawing and ceramics, and a dual degree in anthropology focusing in biological anthropology. My artistic perspective focuses on the exploration of life and death through a natural and historical lens, with a specific interest in the cultural impacts history makes on art. Taking inspiration from the mysticism and potentially averting nature of the subjects, I use topics like this to create conversation about the correlations between aesthetics and history, which reflect my degree programs. Over the course of this summer, I will be attending a forensic anthropology field school outside of Valencia, Spain to learn to identify exhumed victims of the Spanish Civil War. I will complete a full recording and study of at least one individual, and more if time permits. This program includes extensive travel to local Civil War sites, including Teruel and Valencia. The goal of the school is to learn how to contextualize the analysis of human remains with historical events, how to engage with stakeholders and how to study victims of war atrocities and mass burials.

I was moved deeply by observing the series of paintings by the Spanish painter Francisco De Goya, The Black Paintings. His portrayal of the atrocities of war during the Napoleonic Wars and how they left a black spot in the history of Spain inspire me to bring light to this subject for the more recent Spanish Civil War.

Because of the reality of the atrocities of this historical period, I am inspired to take an emotionally creative approach to bring the resilience of the group that survived these crimes to light. To do this, I will be producing a short stop-motion animation utilizing three-dimensional (3D) hand modeled elements inspired by the 1940s Spanish song “Tatuaje” by Conchita Piquer.  Stop-motion is a form of animation in which physical objects are manipulated over video to produce the illusion of movement. The themes and research behind this project are inspired by my experience studying in Spain last summer and living in Valencia, where Conchita Piquer is from.

“Tatuaje” is significant to Spaniards and victims of the Spanish Civil War because it reflects the resilience of their culture through the fascist regime in Spain, and mourning their loved ones after the war. You can find a recording of the song here. It further resonates with me because of the subversive female perspective of the narrator. It is an empowering song for Spanish women, subverting the narrative placed on them. Subversion is the basis for my personal creative practice, and her expected role of submission under the fascist regime is subverted by the cultural context of the song, which will inspire this creative work.  

I plan to convey this imagery using stop-motion because it will challenge me in my career of sculpture to push my expertise by creating 3D elements that can be animated over a sequence of time. I will apply to exhibit the work in the Phyllis Strauss Gallery, and distribute the lyrics to the song printed in Spanish and English. To execute an animation of my own artistic design with industry-standard equipment would be the strong graduating thesis which springboards my career trajectory into my dream field of stop-motion.