Tracy + the Plastics

Wynne Greenwood discusses her new record, the relationships between art and identity, and how she feels about high heels

By Amber Drea
Published: June 9th, 2004 | 1:30pm

Playing the parts of all three members in the virtual band Tracy + the Plastics, Wynne Greenwood presents an alternate dimension in which different parts of herself exist separately and simultaneously. Her second full-length album, Culture For Pigeon (Troubleman Unlimited), is a more accurate representation of the interactive live-show experience than her debut, Muscler’s Guide To Videonics (Chainsaw). It comes with a DVD containing two videos. The first is a humorous yet thought-provoking band rehearsal, in which Nikki, Cola, and Tracy make some surprising revelations to each other but don’t get much done, and the second is a short film that combines Greenwood’s ideas in a more abstract way. As part of the 2004 Whitney Biennial, Tracy + the Plastics has stepped beyond the confines of the rock band into the realm of fine art, further confirming Greenwood’s importance as a contemporary multi-media performance artist.

Culture For Pigeon is more personal and not so much about creating a persona. You’ve said in past interviews that Tracy + the Plastics came out of being a soundtrack for a film about these people who lived in the mountains, but now it seems that it’s just about you.
Yeah, that just happened. And it was so necessary. It made the band really confusing for me for a while because I had discarded that original plot line, which was so easy to follow. And it just shifted in this way that was so important and so necessary for me as a person, as an artist, to keep going with it, because it just would’ve become boring to me if I just had to keep singing about these made-up characters all the time.

Was there a specific change in your life that made you start looking more inward?
I think it was just this really natural progression, kind of reassessing why I was making music. So I made the first record and I went on tour and did all the things that a band is supposed to do. And then I guess a couple years after I started the band ... I just was like, I still have to sing. Like, this is something that is so in me. So I think it just grew up a little bit, what I was singing about or what was coming out of me. And also I moved across the country from Olympia to New York, which is such a huge thing.

On the album cover, you thanked your father for musical inspiration and "the great tunes." What specific things did he play for you that made an impression?
He brought us up on just the greatest music. There was such a variety. But some really specific ones were Musical Youth, Max Romeo & the Upsetters, Parliament. [My dad] actually gave me my first guitar [at 15].

So was music your first artistic medium or had you been doing visual art before that?
I’d been doing visual art. It’s so funny, I was just remembering the other day the first art class I ever took, which was in seventh grade. And it just seems like an absolute total nightmare. I guess it’s kind of like [that] when you think back to anything that you did without a consciousness of doing it. You know, when you were just like, I’m making a clay teddy bear because I love teddy bears and that’s the sole reason of why you’re [creating].

Did you bake the teddy bear in a kiln?
(Laughs) Yeah, I remember there must have been forty people in the class and we were just sandwiched in. It was just like complete chaos and mess. And the person who was the art teacher was the volley ball coach, too. Like she probably really didn’t know anything about — I mean, she probably did, but I don’t know if it was her first passion to be teaching art class. And so one of the projects was [to] bring in a picture from a magazine and you’re gonna make it in clay. (Laughs) Anyways, it was just so random.

Was that in New Jersey?
That was in Washington. [But] it was when I moved to New Jersey that I kind of just threw myself into art and took as many classes as I could. [I] was really, really into sculpture actually and the teddy bear paid off. I think from sculpture came the video. I think sculpture and video are so connected.

Would you ever start working with music more than video or vice versa?
Yeah, I think next I really need to start separating them out. It can go either way. I think what I [attempted] to do with the DVD, which I’m not really sure if it totally works but it’s OK cuz it’s an attempt, which is always good, was to try to marry them a little more. Like [in] the sound and image process, which one does come first? And what makes what happen, the image or the sound? I’m conflicted [because] the process of attaching a sound to an image and seeing where it goes and seeing what kind of story that creates [is] so exciting to me.

On the DVD, Nikki and Cola tell Tracy that the band name upholds "the hierarchy of the rock band." Would you ever consider changing the name of the band or moving away from that? Or was it just a joke?
(Laughs) It’s definitely a joke, but I’ve thought about what if Nikki had a solo project.

That would be so awesome.
(Laughs) I know, but I don’t know if I could actually ever bring myself to do it. But the possibilities are so endless. There are so many crazy new mythologies that could happen. It’s like a whole different world.

Humor is obviously very prominent in your video and your performance. Is this something you intend to do when you start creating the script?
Part of it is probably not intentional because it’s — I mean, obviously it’s totally intentional what I choose to say and how I choose to act as these characters. But there’s a total abandon that’s so sincere in these performances. I mean, it is art for art’s sake. It’s just kind of like no apologies, this is what’s happening. It’s totally truthful and honest in that way.

You seem like you really become the characters.
(Laughs) I know, it’s so crazy. It feels crazy sometimes. I’m like, "I am crazy. I just went crazy."

Do you feel that being queer is a major part of your artistic identity? And is it more than it used to be?
It’s different than it used to be. Being queer is so funny to me because you just have these moments when you’re like, "Oh my god, I’m gay!" I’ll be riding in a car and my mind will be wandering and then I’m like, "Wow. I do not have sex with men and I never will." That is so revolutionary. That is so wild. My world is totally upside down. And then the process of constantly coming out either to yourself or to other people is so intimate and it’s so weird. There are totally people in my life who I’m not out to yet, who I can’t remember if I’m out to, or it’s like, wow, do I need to tell this person that that’s who I am or what? And so I’m no longer in a space where it’s this really new thing to me or where I’m constantly feeling like I have to fight for it anymore. It’s like I’m out of that first-step phase and now it’s really seeping into me. Just owning this identity and walking around with it and then realizing how much it actually does affect the art that I make and the politics that I have and the way that I see the world.

You wrote in the essay on the album cover that you’ve learned "there’s a process of coming out that is inherent in making a video, as well as living as an independent, feminist, artist." How do you connect those two things?
I think I connect them in the editing process. And it’s so funny because the editing — this is such a cheesy metaphor that has happened in my life for real — but when I started editing videos outside of school, I just used my VCR and my camera. And I would always try to make a space [for editing] in whatever room I was living in at the time. And it would inevitably be in the closet because it’s a dark, small space that perfectly fit a chair and a TV and a VCR. So I used to edit in the closet. And I think what I mean [when I say] making a video is like coming out is the deliberateness with which you have to live your life or the deliberateness with which you have to edit a video. It’s in the process of choice, I think, and putting clips together is the same way you kind of put together your identity and your life.

Why do you think it is that people who are gay feel that they have to actually say the words "I’m gay" to everybody?
Well, you only have to if you feel safe about it. But if you do feel safe about it and if you’re in a place where you’re not going to be hurt by doing that, then silence equals death. The fact that you can say those words and claim that space is not just for you. It’s like you’re creating a space for other people to be able to do that and you’re creating a space for people to potentially be safer than they are now.

What I mean is, I take it for granted that I live in a time where people can just be who they are and not have to wear it as a nametag. But maybe because I’m a heterosexual, I don’t understand how it feels to have to explain yourself.
Right. And I think a lot of people don’t. I mean, there’s plenty of queer people, queer artists, who are making art and things and being public figures even that aren’t out and don’t feel like it’s necessary. And that’s ... fine. (Laughs) You can live your life. You can be a democrat and not say you’re a democrat. That’s a really dumb [comparison]. (Laughs)

I think you put the essays on the cover because you thought they would explain things, but they actually just create more questions.
(Laughs) I know, I totally was like, alright, Wynne, this is the time when you’re just gonna totally explain everything. Everybody’s gonna be like, "This is why she does this project."

You wrote that you’re goal is no longer the "high five." What is your goal now?
Communication. Yeah, totally. I realized that last week actually. I was like, wow, I want my art to communicate. [So] I guess I should start being a little clearer or more obvious, but I think and I hope that the art that I make, or have made thus far, has been communicating not just on a wordy level, but on a really gut level and emotionally. And I also hope that it inspires. Communicates and inspires. And whether that be through some crazy, intense dialogue, it doesn’t matter, as long as it’s happening.

I do not think that you need to be more obvious about what you’re saying because no matter what, people are being moved by it, even if they don’t completely understand it. After I watched the DVD a couple times, I started to understand more, but I think that art needs to be that way, it needs to be something you watch or look at or listen to over and over again and it keeps revealing layers and more layers.
That’s so funny. I was just remembering times when I would just listen to something over and over and over and over again and then realizing that ... that process puts it inside of you. That thing that you listen to over and over or watch over and over you have to get inside of you. You know that feeling? And then it’s there always and it’s so amazing.

In the essay you wrote it in winter of 2002, you also say that you were against using digital video. Why you were against it and why did you change your mind?
I was against it because it wasn’t accessible to me. I learned video editing in 1995 or ’96, and in college, it wasn’t what you learned. You had to take a couple classes before you got to the digital editing. It was new enough even then that it wasn’t this automatic thing that you just got to do. So it just wasn’t accessible and it wasn’t accessible to anyone I knew. I just didn’t use it and I wasn’t for it and then ... it started becoming more and more accessible, I guess. Now it’s crazy because they’re not even making that many VCRs anymore or they’re not even making non-digital cameras. Things are kind of shifting in the world, which is really weird. So I think I gave in a little bit.

Do you find it better in anyway?
It’s definitely opened up a lot of ideas for me. The whole image sound relationship that I’m exploring now is probably based on digital editing. It’s been really helpful and really, really inspiring, but also it’s really inspiring to just throw together some footage on a VCR still. The process is so different. I just think they both have such exciting things to offer that are so different. And just the physical process of each one is so different.

How do you feel about being in the 2004 Whitney Biennial?
A little crazy. It’s amazing. I feel really honored that they asked me to be a part of it, especially cuz it seems like such an exciting exhibition this time. There’s just a lot of great people involved, and I’m really, really excited to see what everybody has done. It’s weird. I don’t know how I’m supposed to feel. I guess, excited and honored.

Did you ever think that Tracy + the Plastics would ever be part of something like that?
No. No. No. When I started doing this band, it’s so funny … I didn’t even know that this world existed, I didn’t even know the Whitney Biennial existed or had no idea what that would even be when I first started doing this. And so it’s so funny to think back and the whole process of finding about these new worlds is weird. It’s really exciting.

My first impression of Tracy + the Plastics was that you are a musician who uses video, but now I see that it’s so much more than that. Did you originally see it as being more than that?
Yeah, I did. When I started, [I wanted to] play queer disco clubs and art galleries. But still ... I felt like a renegade art person. [Because] I didn’t really know the terms or something. But I think that the great thing about art is that you don’t have to. And the great thing about punk culture is that you don’t have to know the terms either. You just kind of make it up. But I totally came at the actual show from a rock perspective. I was just like, I’m just making up a band because I don’t have one and I want one.

Nikki, Cola, and Tracy all sort of represent different aspects of you and this sense of the fragmented self. Is part of your goal to become a whole, to feel like whatever you’re putting out is you, and there’s no other side that you’re leaving out?
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, I started coming to that realization two summers ago when it was my first summer at Bard. I was videotaping Nikki and I was like, I wanna be wearing this outfit as Wynne. I don’t want Nikki to wear this, cuz it’s kind of like if I wear an outfit as Nikki, then that’s Nikki’s outfit and I don’t wear it. And I was like, goddamnit, I don’t want Nikki to be wearing this outfit. I really like it and I really want to wear it. The thing is, I wouldn’t wear it. It involved high heels and I do not ever wear high heels. And I was just kind of like, wow, I just really need to be me. [But] these characters have been really great because they’ve allowed me to explore parts of myself and really let parts of myself go that I would be maybe too shy [to let go]. This is such a dumb example, but I’ve never worn high heels and you get to a point in your life where you’re like, I don’t wear high heels. But really, it’s like, why not? You could wear high heels sometime. Who’s to say that you could not ever wear high heels? You just kind of form your identity and you sometimes can stop questioning it or stop trying to form it. So those characters really allowed me to keep forming my identity, but also they allowed me to hide, or to be like, that’s not really me. Yeah, I totally just want to be Wynne Greenwood sometimes. But when I step back and think about Tracy and the Plastics as a project, then I’m like, that project was made by Wynne Greenwood. That’s not me split up into so many things. I can draw an outline around it now. And the shape ... yeah, anyways. I’m going off. (Laughs)

Nikki’s style has evolved so much, with the headband and the earrings, and then she gives the peace sign on the video but then it turns into this new wave dance move.
Right, totally. Nikki, like, freaked out. Also, the level of [Nikki’s and Cola’s] performances directly correlates to the level of stressed out that I feel. There’s something in me that snaps when I put on a wig. You totally let go.

Did you know that Nikki was going to give the peace sign, look right at the camera, and make that coy "I’m a model" face?
(Laughs) No, I told myself that Nikki had to look more at the camera. That’s the only direction I gave myself. So then it just happened and it was really weird. I would never ever do that. I don’t know what that means. I’m sure I could go to therapy for a while. But this totally is my therapy.