Curriculum Vitae

Artist Statement

Cutie Beauty & Siri say it best, Mirrors and eyes, fences and disguise - regardless of how others define us, or shield us, I think of beauty as empathy - the enigma that continually tempts me to provoke boundaries, exposing tensions and bonds that develop within.

I enjoy writing screen plays and songs, creating and performing characters, developing immersive landscape composites, and working collaboratively to produce multi-media film productions. I am interested in symbiotic relationships and the narratives that unfold when introducing conditions of action, motion, and emotion before the camera. Using passive camera techniques to explore cycles and potential outcomes, my recent works explore intersections and transformations among character, condition, and vantage, provoking boundaries to expose or hide or identify.

I like fly swatters, but not nearly as much as observing horses standing head to tail to swat the flies from the others eyes. This companionship can be mistaken as courtship. It’s mostly about enabling sleep without discomfort of itchy, stingy eyes. Some horsemen braid a horse’s tail to look pretty, tying it off with tiny bows to add super cuteness. But then the horse cannot use the tail to swat the eyes, and flies feed on their tears. The desire for pretty and cute has compromised the most vulnerable connection with empathy – the eyes. Such paradoxes inspire my multimedia narratives. Whether inside a dugout, a camper trailer, or alongside a Pretty Fence, all my persona-based characters entertain the gap between liminal clarity and misunderstood realities.

 

Her ongoing saga “Cutie Beauty & The Trailer Of Doom!” employs themes of memetics, imitation theory, and human adaptive systems for meaning-making to create a mereological person, Cutie Beauty, whose disposition shifts from part-relation into whole-human formation.


 

Cutie Beauty & The Beast Bear-Sometimes-Man

(Episode Soundtrack) filmed live at Andralamusya

by Keeara Rhoades, Narrated by Brian Wetzstein (2013)


Cutie Beauty & The BAT-SWING Fly

(Episode 8) filmed live at Center on Contemporary Art (CoCA)

WALKING WHILE CUTE (IS NOT A CRIME)

"Walking While Cute is not a Crime (Marching While Cute Is)" is an action-scripted performance in reaction to an injustice "marginalized and denied" captured by police dash cam, "Drop the golf club, it's a weapon!" William Wingate is an Air Force veteran and retired Seattle King County Metro bus driver.

"Walking While Black" Police dash-cam video from July 9, 2014. Seattle – an elderly man walks with a golf club as a cane. Police officer stops him, “drop the club, It’s a weapon!” she demands of him. He is caught off guard, noticeably confused. He asks, “Why, I didn’t do anything wrong. This is my cane, I’ve been using it for 20 years.” Calling for backup, the officer proceeds to arrest this suspect-pedestrian American. In response to this injustice, I wrote the screenplay and performance, “Cutie Beauty, Walking While Cute (is not a crime)

Creators

Cutie Beauty & The Trailer Of Doom! Is a Graphic-Tele-Novella™ by visual artist and performer, Keeara Rhoades in collaboration with Paul E. Berger. Working with their University of Washington School of Art classes, Berger developed a working subtext while Rhoades initiated character identity and first video prompt. As an episode-based collaborative project, contributors are invited to help invent the character and the world of Cutie Beauty. In reaction, Cutie Beauty invents nonsensical products and instructional videos to critique the social constructs placed upon her and to entertain the gap between liminal clarity and misunderstood realities.

Keeara Rhoades
Production | Screenplay

"& Friends"
Contributions

Paul Berger
Subtext

view comic book

 

Collaborators & Characters

Keeara Rhoades
Cutie Beauty

Paul Berger
Bear-Sometimes-Man

Brian Rentley
Ward Wardlow XIV

Parker J
Cub-Sometimes-Cat

"& Friends"
Contributors

"Yet To Be"
You?

Mel Carter
Mariya

Anna Erickson
Magdalena

Ripple Fang
No 'Se (bootleg)

Benji Laing
Sergio (talk show host)

Brit Ruggirello
Glam Ensemble

Hanita Schwartz
Andralamusya

 

Cody Strauss
Cutie Beauty Doppleganger

Mark Nettleton
!-Sometimes-? Mark

Josh Hovel
Freddy (Sergio's camera-man)

Jordan Augustine
The Puppeteer

Langford Griffing
Lord Langford

 

Katy Lester
Glam Ensemble

Max Cleary
Glam Ensemble

Alex Boeschenstein
Glam Ensemble

Arana Wang
Mystery Character

Debbi Johanson
Baroness Nicosphere
& Harpmonious Monkey

Daniel Cook
Danjo on Banjo

Be part of the Adventures of Cutie Beauty!


The Project.

 

How to Participate

Cutie Beauty's family is growing

  • contact for a Cutie Beauty prompt (email / form)
  • send original contributions to Keeara Rhoades (email / form)
  • assist Keeara on set or in studio / contact for production dates
  • currently seeking collaborators, sponsors, interns to help Cutie Beauty travel the globe / contact for details!

 


Contribute.

Tune in to Cutie Beauty's Youtube Channel and watch
Cutie Beauty & Friends as they adventure into realms and wonderlands, exploring boundaries, human tensions and bonds however fragmented or fleeting they may seem.

watch episode promos here

scroll down to view episodes and feature content


EPISODE PREVIEWS

production in-progress


PILOT: Where in the World is Cutie Beauty

A two-tone camper trailer arrives, it’s time to unpack! CB jumps on the bed, opens suitcases, throws clothes and costumes, pulls out a wall paper scrap, NAILs it on the wall... Buried beneath the tantrum, an eye reveals something impossible ... Folding her MAP, Cutie Beauty rises from her LOG, takes a SWING with her leg-BAT and then ...

First prompt handoff for Cutie Beauty & The Trailer Of Doom!, sent to Paul Berger's Art 341 class at The University of Washington. Sent from Spain: UW Studio Art in Spain

Sketch: Cutie beauty’s adventure to Brunch at Mariya y Magdalena's 

Captured by, Bear-Sometimes-Man Cam
LEON, SPAIN

Cutie Beauty is always late!

So Many Secrets: First prompt handoff (for EPISODE 1)

It's a webcam confessional.
NO' SE REVEALS NOTHING

This is no ordinary brunch, and no ordinary refrigerator. 

First Prompt Handoff (webcam confessional, “Mandy” wig, RhymoDomino Cards) SKETCH for the Pilot: “Brunch at Magdalena y Mariya's” Featuring, Cutie Beauty, Mariya, Magdalena, Sergio, Freddy, No Se' (as Mandy) Leon, Spain

EPISODE 3: A Ballad For Cutie Beauty

For the first time, Cutie Beauty is witnessed outside her camper-trailer, lounging on her lawn chair, making Sweet-Tea-Bear sun tea, reading her Bear-Sometimes-Man comic and post-marked letters from Friends, while also courted with live acoustic ballads, written especially for her! As part of the NEPO 5K Art Walk on Saturday, Sept 7th, this live episode shoot features many camera types and characters. Witness Cutie Beauty as never captured before! Join Cutie Beauty, Ward Wardlow XIV & Friends in the sun!

Cutie Beauty & Friends Present, "A Ballad For Cutie Beauty (a courtship in the sun)" . Featuring, Inside Your Tin Room (Bitsyras), a prompt song for Cutie Beauty, performed live and filmed at NEPO 2013. A Ballad For Cutie Beauty, script and screenplay by Keeara Rhoades; Comic, Bear-Sometimes-Man, by Paul E. Berger; Video exhibited at Bellingham National, Whatcom Museum (Bellingham, WA) 2015

Cutie Beauty & The Beast Bear-Sometimes-Man (Live Episode credits)

Cozy in her camper-trailer bed, Cutie Beauty has a dream. Come peer through her window. Witness Cutie Beauty as never captured before: under covers, with visions of a beast and secret hiding places. Be part of the studio audience. This is a live episode shoot with many camera types and characters. Join Cutie Beauty, Ward Wardlow XIV, Bear-Sometimes-Man & Friends as they adventure into the darkness! 

The Credits: Closing the live episode shoot of Cutie Beauty & The Beast Bear-Sometimes-Man, this webcam capture reveals the cast of characters: Ward Wardlow XIV, Sergio, Bear-Sometimes-Man, Cutie Beauty and her Subconscious Character, '"& Friends" Mariya, Magdalena, No 'Se, Mystery Character (from under the bed), Britt & Freddy. This episode was filmed and performed live at Andralamusya before a studio audience.

Episode 5: A Cub Shower For Cutie Beauty

Cutie Beauty & Ward Wardlow XIV are expecting! Cub-Sometimes-Cat is doo-due on May Day, 2014! Please join them in celebrating his much anticipated arrival as Cutie Beauty reveals So Many Secrets. Clap as Ward Wardlow XIV & Friends play Cub theme songs live and freeze as Cutie Beauty debuts her newest product commercials for,The Duty Pop & Pee-Pod, The Eye-Fly-Glow, and Tornado Sky (a Cutie Beauty Colour). Join CB, her Doppelganger & Friends in learning the Bear-Sometimes-Man Walk (to his theme song), and watch as CBs Friend, Magdalena introduces the Cub-Sometimes-Cat Crawl with a Cub-Crawl Challenge Puppet Show by Binjo Pejama and Danjo on banjo! And, hold tight as CB & Friend Mariya introduce The Gas Maneuver! As part of the Graphic-Tele-Novella, Cutie Beauty & The Trailer Of Doom!, this is a live product shoot with hidden cameras, Plum Pudding and Mash-up sandwiched by No Se's Bootleg, & live music by Baroness Nicasphere (& her harp) Harpmonious Monkey, Ward Wardlow XIV, !-Sometimes-?Mark, and Lord Langford. Plus, games, party favors & activities for everyone! Help us construct an identity for her soon-to-be-due Cub-Sometimes-Cat.

SPY CAM Footage - Dali Bull Pictures & Andralamusya present, A Cub Shower for Cutie Beauty, So Many Secrets Revealed! Starring cutie beauty, ward wardlow xiv, cutie beauty doppleganger, mariya, magdalena, no se',  lord langford, !-sometimes-? mark, baroness nicosphere (with harpmonious monkey), bingo pejama, danjo, & cub-sometimes-cat (unborn) / directed by hanita schwartz, written by keeara rhoades / special contributions by no se' bootleg, bitsyras, rentley band, debbi johanson, langford griffing, andralamusya, sergio 35mm bw film / featuring "Dylan hears a who - the cat in the hat" a bob dylan impersonator (kevin ryan) & Dr Seuss, "a crawl battle: cub's new groove" A cub-pet show by Jordan Augustine & Daniel Cook,  The Cub-Cat Crawl by Magdalena, The Gas Manouver performed by Mariya, King Jam Rock with String not Drum "Weather Machine" and "inside your tin room" by Bitsyras performed by Mark Nettleton & Brian rentley / "The Brown Beast" by Lord Langford Griffing, "Cub-sometimes-cat", puff the magic dragon remix, plum pudding, art by van goat, Royal gown and Cloaks by Cutie Beauty / Cutie Beauty brand Products: The Duty Pop, The Pee-Pod, The Eye-Fly-glow, Tornado sky (a cutie beauty colour) / so many secrets, a webcam confessional / this footage is captured by a spy cam, Who could it be? is it Bear-sometimes-man? Sergio the talkshow host?Freddy the camera man? mystery character from under the bed? stalker from the go-go club? The real dreamer? the owl?

Cutie Beauty & Cub-Sometimes-Cat in a Cave Pram

Cub-Sometimes-Cat is on his way! While Cutie Beauty is nesting in her Fury Chair, she spends her time inventing products and movements. Check back for part 2 of this segment, Introducing Cutie Beauty's invented color, Tornado Sky. Cutie Beauty will reveal this color at her Cub Shower, hosted at Andralamusya on April 12th, 2014.

Introducing Cutie Beauty's Product Commercial: CB-33 Instant Photo FIlm!

CB-33 Instant Photo Film, The only film that shows you what you’re missing. With CB-33 you get back what you put out!
— Cutie Beauty


CB MEME: Cutie Beauty & The Ice Bucket Challenge

Cutie Beauty & The Ice Bucket Challenge!, brought to you by Cutie Beauty & The Trailer of Doom! Featuring Bear-Sometimes-Man from Paul Berger's comic book, "Waiting For Cutie Beauty". Comic Caption: 

“WHILE I WAS OFF IN DREAMLAND, CUTIE BEAUTY HAD MOVED ON. THE ONLY THING LEFT ON THE SCENE IS WHAT LOOKED LIKE AN OLD DECK OF CARDS.”
— Bear-Sometimes-Man

Cutie Beauty & The BAT-SWING fly

As Cutie Beauty continues her epic adventure around the globe, she takes a timeout to explore the symbiotic relationship exhibited by horse companions as they stand head to tail to swat the flies from the others eyes. In a field beyond the horses, Cutie Beauty discovers another relationship – a lingo of sorts where actions are used to substitute words: plays and signals are used to disguise intent. It’s a baseball game played by four girls, a Pitcher, Catcher, Batter and Umpire. The game is cryptic and Cutie Beauty engages the team to discover just how far they are willing to throw the ball or SWING the BAT.

Prompt Response: Cutie Beauty & the BAT-SWING Fly - under the tornado sky, where flies swarm and action lands surprise. Carrying her super cute baseball bat, encased with a white inside out unstuffed animal bear, Cutie Beauty battles the space between land and sky.

Scene 3: In a Field Beyond the Horses (where bats swing) we are our own team


Cutie Beauty & The BAT-SWING Fly

The Pitcher throws the ball like a bone to a DOG while eyeing the Batter’s strike zone. The Catcher crouches like a FROG. The Batter is in a FOG or a daze while under the Pitcher’s gaze. The Umpire is a board or a LOG – against all odds she is not bored and unalike a boar HOG.
— Cutie Beauty

Episode Prompt response: CBOB & The CAT-ROCK Battle

Live via webcam, witness Cutie Beauty battle fire and shadow using her CAT-ROCK skills.
In this wonder realm adventure, CB raises her flag to defeat the battle between objective subjects and subjective objects. 

In a world torn between Cutie and Beauty, where the Tornado Sky and a two-tone camper trailer collide, one woman must transport vertical lengths -- and sometimes the white caps rise and fall 30 feet within seconds. As above, so below...

People might think you’re a bit funny, but it’s okay, artist’s are allowed to be different!”
— CBob

 

Bear-sometimes-Man Comic book response: A Cameo For Cutie Beauty

Cutie Beauty with her husband, Ward Wardlow XIV, in Spain. Sketch, In-Progress Song: "Ballad for Cutie Beauty", by Brit Ruggirello Comic Book: "Where in the World is Cutie Beauty", "Waiting for Cutie Beauty", "It's all lin the Cards", by Paul E. Berger

 

Final Episode: #ninelivesmatter

In the final episode of the saga, The Adventures of Cutie Beauty & The Trailer Of Doom!, we discover the true identity of Cutie Beauty. Beneath the gaze we recognize Cutie Beauty by a few things: Hair with bangs in strands of blonde and a floral dress stained minty green. So many suitcases construct her wall, housing secrets and wherewithal.

“If everything Cutie Beauty is a dream, If everything Cutie Beauty is a dream, Then who is the dreamer, who is the dreamer?”
— Cutie Beauty

Cutie Beauty Products

Ruby Wrap and Windshield Glass are the Cutie Beauty Currency

 

NICINSENSE (IT JUST MAKES SENSE)

Nicinsense (it just makes sense!), © 2013, Keeara Rhoades
A Cutie Beauty Original Product (commercial)

The first version of Nicinsense debuted in 2004. The photography department at the Herron School of Art awarded an A-grade to anyone who smoked and stopped during Photo 3 -- regardless the work they output. As a non-smoker I was inspired to make a work in response, "Nicinsense, it just makes sense!" Cutie Beauty has repurposed the commercial as her own invention. Watch out for No'Se Bootleg copies of Cutie's Nicinsense product. 

TORNADO SKY (A CUTIE BEAUTY BRAND COLOUR)

Part 2 (of 5)

CB-33 INSTANT PHOTO FILM (THE ONLY FILM THAT SHOWS YOU WHAT YOU'RE MISSING - WITH CB-33 YOU GET BACK WHAT YOU PUT OUT!)

Cutie Beauty & The Trailer Of Doom! (a Graphic-Tele-Novella), brings NEPO Walk, Cutie Beauty & Her Cub-Sometimes-Cat in a Cave Pram! Strolling their young cub in his "Cave Pram", Cutie Beauty and Ward Wardlow XIV introduce their Cub-Sometimes-Cat to his enormous and continually growing family through the creation of Cub's family photo album.

cutie beauty scratch 'n sniff (nobody will know it's you)

A product placement commercial for Cutie Beauty's product, Scratch-N-Sniff Scent. Episode Shoot (scene 5/12): Cutie Beauty & The Beast Bear-Sometimes-Man A live episode shoot @ Andralamusya, October 4th, 2013 (Seattle, WA) Cozy in her camper-trailer bed, Cutie Beauty has a dream. Come peer through her window.

SWEET-TEA-BEAR SUN TEA 

WHITE INSIDEOUT UNSTUFFED ANIMAL BEAR BAT

THE DUTY POP (IT'S ABOUT TIME)

The Duty Pop, It's about time! Presented by Cutie Beauty and Ward Wardlow XIV A Cutie Beauty Brand product

THE PEE-POD (JUST FOR BOYS)

Cutie Beauty features the Pee-Pod during the unveiling of suitcase #8 at her Garage Glam Yard Sale!

THE EYE-FLY GLOW (SHE TAKES IT EVERYWHERE SHE GOES)

ROYAL CLOAKS & GOWN

DALI BULL PLAYING CARD DECK

HOW TO / INSTRUCTIONAL:

Cutie Beauty on ...

How to Clear the Air of Flies

Live feed from CoCA / via Andralamusya Live - It’s all in the Dali Bull Player Cards – Cutie Beauty & the Bullroarer

If you missed Cutie Beauty at Henry Art Gallery performing her Dali Bull Roar for University of Washington students, you can watch her perform it now! Influenced by Ann Hamilton’s current Bullroarer installation at the Henry, Cutie Beauty has learned how to clear flies from the air and call to her bear! With the bullroarer we can hear the sound of distance, and as Ann Hamilton suggests, “hearing is how we touch at a distance”. Cutie is just so tired and just wants to pet her bear.

CBob on, How to Sew Garage Glam (Goat-lamb-ant-man) 

Live feed from Andralamusya Live - How to sew Garage Glam (Goat-Lamb-Ant-Man)

From my two-tone camper trailer, into the Dugout, and then inside a BAT Cave that became Cub-CATs Cave Pram,
the space we claim today is a Garage. It’s a barrage in my garage –

Sometimes when I can’t sleep I think of words that rhyme.
This works better than counting sheep.
SOCK, COCK, CLOCK, LOCK, ROCK --
Hum, what else rhymes?
Bam!, Cram, Clam, Glam!

And I can teach you HOW TO SEW GARAGE GLAM!

You might ask, what is Garage Glam? I shall tell you.

Garage Glam is quite simply a home for GOAT-LAMB-ANT-MAN.

Because Goat-Lamb-Ant-Man has his own permanent insulation, a garage glam is not insulated. And because Goat-Lamb-Ant-Man can carry 100 times the weight of his own body, Goat-Lamb-Ant-Man can take his garage glam with him everywhere he goes. So, it is important that the garage glam is solid in structure with considerate form. Similar to a decorator crab, Goat-Lamb-Ant-Man will design the interior of his garage glam to reflect the nature of his surroundings and preferred aesthetic and tactile content.

Once I was playing the FIELD, while wearing Garage Glam, and I remember thinking, “You can do anything you want to do. This is your world and we're gonna make some big decisions inside our garage glam – Remember, we don't make mistakes, we just have happy accidents. It’s like I tell little Cub-CAT, if you act like a BAT acts, uh uh, you’re working too hard. Standing out in the field, waiting, I drew shapes in the dirt. It was liberating to see that if We just scrape in a few indications of sticks and twigs and other little things in there, people will think you spent hours doing this. Thank you for joining us and remember, if it’s not garage, it’s a mistake. And if it is glam, it is a happy accident.

 

CBob on, How to Make Horses From Porcelain Dolls

CBob on, How to Animate Horses Swatting Flies From The Other’s Eyes

 [archived: Andralamusya]

Movements


THE BEAR-SOMETIMES-MAN WALK (TO HIS THEME SONG)


CUB-SOMETIMES-CAT CRAWL

you've been served!
Cub Shower for Cutie Beauty


Cutie Beauty & The dali Bullroarer

The Stop-Drop-Roll-Duck-Cover

Goat-Lamb-Ant-MAN Dance off Serving



Cutie Beauty MEME Break Dance – 

Performed live at the Center on Contemporary Art (Seattle)

Where does Cutie Beauty go when not on the road, and why is she always late?
Discover her in waiting (“I have to transport vertical lengths”) –
Cutie Beauty within her fragmented space, moving to MEME mash-ups she calls,
It's All in the Cardboard - a Cutie Beauty Break Dance.

 

Monologues

CB speaks to the camera


words with a log
CBlog: 13 Monlolgues

CBlog: Two Pink Lines (1/13 monologues)

Watch all 13 CBlog's

 


Cutie Beauty’s Garage Glam Yard Sale

15 Suitcases (see what's inside)
Windshield Glass & Ruby Wrap are the CB Currency

"Cutie Beauty's Garage Glam Yard Sale! (Windshield Glass and Ruby Wrap is the Cutie Beauty currency)" Garage Sale! Yard Glam! Cutie Beauty has run out of space and is selling so many things! Her epic Garage Sale features only the best Yard Glam. You might ask, do you take IOUs or barters or is everything free? Windshield Glass and Ruby Wrap is the Cutie Beauty currency.

discover contents of all 15 suitcases