Production of ugly in screen arts: analysis ofAmerican Horror Story- Freak Show'scharacters' "Dot and Bette"

In this paper, notion of ugliness is examined within the context of aesthetics and philosophy of art via embedded theory. Examination is based on the character conjoined twins Dot and Bette from the fourth season named Freak Show of anthology series American Horror Story created by Brad Falchuk and Ryan Murphy. The aim of the study is to research ugliness as a term that is appealing and exciting for people existing as communities throughout time that are using the term to confirm their existence and normality and to examine the production of ugliness in screen arts. As research continued following notions came up for further research: aesthetic phenomenon, aesthetic emotion, pleasure, bizarre, uncanny, grotesque. These terms were researched via their relationship with the terms body, deformed body, freak body and conjoined body. The theoretical research went further with technical research on chosen case study American Horror Story: Freak Show character Dot and Bette. Acted by Sarah Paulson, conjoined twins Dot and Bette is a screen character that is created by using cosmetic and SFX makeup, computer generated effects (CGI) and practical animatronic effects. It was scripted with an inspiration from the human circuses that commonly existed in USA in 20th century. This case and this character are fitting for this research with their nature which confirms the normality of simple human being and arouses the lure of the ugliness. Character is examined in detail through the technical facilities such as makeup artistry, CGI, robotic effects, framing of the scenes, actresses unique acting techniques, director's visual narrative approach, status of the ugly in the script. The pleasure that all elements listed above provided for the audience is also included in the research. As a result of the examination and research carried out, notion of ugly that is produced via practical and digital technologies is found to be relative to time and society. The recreation of an ugly being at the present time could also be a pleasure giving beautiful notion.