Friday, May 14, 2010
Working Artist Statement
This work is about the performance of “The Good Girl.” It talks about how she is fabricated, how she operates, how she presents herself, who she’s trying to impress, and the exhaustion of the falsified experience.
“The Good Girl” is not a specific person or set of actions, for it shows up differently in whoever is pulling the strings. For some, it could be a conservative way of dressing that supposedly keeps people from looking at the sexualized body beneath. For other’s it’s a fake smile, put on to keep people from asking the hard questions. It can take the form of perfectionism, with every duck neatly in row to escape an avalanche of critical reactions. Rather then rebelling, “The Good Girl” puts on a performance. Rather then giving up, she puts on more layers.
Nancy Friday discusses the formation of The Good Girl at length in her book The Power of Beauty.
“I believe we all, men and women, give up far more the necessary to fit the ridged standards of adolescence. The biggest mistake I’ve made in life, the roads not taken and opportunities not seized, I am sure, today, might have been avoided if only I’d been able to take into adolescence the girl I’d been prior to it. Reining her in, forcing her to obey the restricting rules by which girls had to live made me acutely self-conscious, overly cautious, unsure of myself, second-guessing everything for the rest of my life. And angry, don’t leave out anger at abandoning myself, teeth-grinding anger that I dutifully swallowed and ‘forgot.’”
In my work, the protagonist takes on the forms of the ballerina and the princess, both of whom are a repository for cultural stigmas on womanhood, filled with expectations of perfectionism, beauty, meekness and grace. Inherent in their job description is a necessity to keep their audience at bay while simultaneously creating a longing for their status and beauty.
I embody both of these characters in order to express my need to be one of them, identifying with the artifice that creates a wide gate around them. In reality, my stage becomes the hallway and the kitchen, the shopping mall and the restaurant. My act is a reveal that shows nothing more than what other people need me to be. The finale shows the princess in a pink dress, breathing heavily, exhausted and humanized, but ready to jump again tomorrow.
“The Good Girl” is not a specific person or set of actions, for it shows up differently in whoever is pulling the strings. For some, it could be a conservative way of dressing that supposedly keeps people from looking at the sexualized body beneath. For other’s it’s a fake smile, put on to keep people from asking the hard questions. It can take the form of perfectionism, with every duck neatly in row to escape an avalanche of critical reactions. Rather then rebelling, “The Good Girl” puts on a performance. Rather then giving up, she puts on more layers.
Nancy Friday discusses the formation of The Good Girl at length in her book The Power of Beauty.
“I believe we all, men and women, give up far more the necessary to fit the ridged standards of adolescence. The biggest mistake I’ve made in life, the roads not taken and opportunities not seized, I am sure, today, might have been avoided if only I’d been able to take into adolescence the girl I’d been prior to it. Reining her in, forcing her to obey the restricting rules by which girls had to live made me acutely self-conscious, overly cautious, unsure of myself, second-guessing everything for the rest of my life. And angry, don’t leave out anger at abandoning myself, teeth-grinding anger that I dutifully swallowed and ‘forgot.’”
In my work, the protagonist takes on the forms of the ballerina and the princess, both of whom are a repository for cultural stigmas on womanhood, filled with expectations of perfectionism, beauty, meekness and grace. Inherent in their job description is a necessity to keep their audience at bay while simultaneously creating a longing for their status and beauty.
I embody both of these characters in order to express my need to be one of them, identifying with the artifice that creates a wide gate around them. In reality, my stage becomes the hallway and the kitchen, the shopping mall and the restaurant. My act is a reveal that shows nothing more than what other people need me to be. The finale shows the princess in a pink dress, breathing heavily, exhausted and humanized, but ready to jump again tomorrow.
Thursday, May 13, 2010
Tuesday, May 11, 2010
Claude Cahun: Don't Kiss Me
This photo, by 1920's Surrealist photographer Claude Cahun was running through the back of my mind as I made The People Pleaser. While Cahun worked most directly with gender ambiguity, show also presented feminine expectations in a new and confusing way. In the photograph above, Cahun tells us that we aren't allowed to kiss her because she's in training. In training for what? And who wanted to kiss her are the first questions that come to mind. I identify with the idea of keeping your audience at bay, while simultaneously teasing them with what could happen if they were only allowed. I also think that idea of training is essential to my work. I'm constantly exploring the ways female is conditioned and brought up through structured expectations of what it means to be "good" and feminine.
Monday, May 3, 2010
Kate Gilmore
Kate Gilmore is somewhat of a Lone Ranger. At the present time she is working exclusively in video, creating single take films of her performances in front of the camera. In her videos we often see Gilmore climbing, breaking through, lifting or struggling against formidable barriers. As Gilmore struggles for resolution we realize that everything is happening authentically and nothing is predictable. Gilmore’s scenes are never rehearsed and her uncertainty and determination shows as she works to achieve her goal. The unrehearsed methodology mimics real life, talking about the obstacles that women face in the corporate and private world, where the outcome is never predictable.
We are made acutely aware of Gilmore’s femininity throughout her performances. She is always in a demure skirt or dress; wearing heels that often aid in kicking through the plaster walls she puts up. Her outfit is completed with bright colored lipstick and dainty black gloves. Although her femininity is not heightened to extreme measures, we are certain that we are watching the struggles of a female in society.
Her motifs, such as breaking through plaster walls and climbing up wooden planks on roller skates speak to insurmountable obstacles facing women in the workplace and society. The beauty of the work is Gilmore’s ability to approach the challenge without resentment, going head on to achieve the goal. And sometimes, but not all the time, she comes out a winner.
With Open Arms
In this video, made in 2005, Gilmore stands in front of the camera with her arms wide open. She grins at us with a forced, exaggerated smile and a flower in her hair while unseen enemies hurl tomatoes at her overdressed figured and star studded background.
The tomatoes look like they sting Gilmore’s skin as she stands ready and waiting for the attack and she often has to lower her arms and cover her face to wipe the remnants of the red flesh from her face.
The act is one of endurance. How much pain can she withstand, smiling and open armed before she starts yelling and screaming at the enemies behind the camera? Patience in the face of pain is the most prominent feature of this particular video. And it is so clearly a feminine patience. She stands in front of us with her dress stained red and smiles, waiting for it out so she can win.
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