Lea Devon Sorrentino
October 2-31, 2021
Do you have the feeling like something is wrong, missing, uncomfortable, moving to fast, moving to slow, overwhelming, awkward, misunderstood, kinda lonely, too crowded, out of control, too good to be true, out of reach, beneath you, above you, dried up, dumb, out smarting you, frustrating, confusing, obvious, a train wreck, too close to perfect, not perfect enough, kind of ugly, boring, over before it began, disheartening, less than what is appears, too good to be true, spoiling the mood, awful, sickening, broken, hard to love, kind of off or just the worst? Are you trying to find a way to start feeling like you are winning while you constantly lose? GREAT! YOU NEED HELP is a series of training videos aiming to get your life seemingly back on track!
about the artist:
Lea Devon Sorrentino is a multi-media artist who has exhibited her work nationally and internationally. Her practice is an autoethnographical investigation of life in pursuit of understanding the contradictions of American success. Her practice uses humor and popular culture to investigate the emotional investments we place in possessions and entertainment to create individuality.
artist statement:
My work calls attention to the constructs of first world success, structural oppression and the emotional investments society places in possessions, social platforms and entertainment. Or, in not art speak, I am interested in why we hate our bodies, spend money we don’t have, shout into the internet ether and cry at reality television.
My work contains personal narratives that are mixed with cultural rituals in an attempt to examine how, as a society; we manage feelings of inadequacy towards the high expectations of feeling successful. Aesthetically, I construct spaces (virtual and physical) that possess uncanny qualities to highlight exaggerated consumerism. By dramatizing my personal experiences I generate a dialogue with the audience about how the personal often reflects the political.
At the core, my work attempts to make visible the necessity for understanding our relationship to consumerism. This begins with critically examining America’s definition of success under Capitalism, and how that perception generates delusional expectations. My work intends to address the ridiculousness and impossibility of achieving success and the effect it has on our daily behavior that creates unhealthy relationships to seemingly innocuous experiences.
