Pressure | veronicaleto

Food is Indulgence.

Video installation. 22 minutes run time. 2021.

In these moments of allowing myself to be a grown up body driven by a wild inner child, I am recovering a vital connection to my truest self.

Food is... complicated, though I wish it wasn’t. When I was a kid, food was just fun. Treats were guilt free. There was no shame in having ice cream dripping down my chin. It was a time of blanket forts and getting lost in my imagination. Then diet culture killed my vibe, twisting me into a disordered eating mess. Food devoid of emotion does not deliver contentment. This work imagines a future where I have healed my relationship with food and returned to a personal consumption philosophy of playful indulgence, deep comfort, and joyous celebration.

Grazing

Wearable garments fabricated with paper Xerox copies of vintage muumuu patterns, packing tape. 40” x 56” each. Presented as a digital collage. 2021.

My recent research has centered on the muumuu dress and how they have been used in various ways to shame women about their bodies. The garment was introduced to Polynesian culture by Christian missionaries in the 1800’s to cover the native women’s bodies up in the name of modesty. In pop culture, the muumuu dress is synonymous with fatness, ugliness, and laziness, and often employed by men in misogynistic and homophobic contexts. Here I am recontextualizing the wearing of a muumuu and embodying joy.

Fat Cow Muumuu Garments

Wearable garments fabricated with paper Xerox copies of vintage muumuu patterns, packing tape. 40” x 56” each. 2021.

Panda Pocket Queerantine

Made during the Spring 2020 lockdown when all we had was nature walks and take out in the car to escape, and even that felt risky. I leaned on music the most to pass time during the anxiety highs. Video: 2:34 runtime. 2020.

I Have Questions

Artist book made from paper scraps during Spring 2020 as a reaction to the first quarantine semester. It explores the despair, confusion, and rage of that April. (Read by artist.) Book form: 5.5" x 2.5" x 1/2"

Fatshion GIF

Animated GIF of photography and digital art. 2021. This video shows the digital editing process of my fat fashion magazine takeovers from the original magazine page, to my attempt at composing the look with my own clothes, and the digital edits to slot my version into the layout.