Tuesday, May 6, 2008

What the fuck are you looking at?



A beautiful portrayal of vulnerability-this powerful photograph evokes compassion and sadness in me, perhaps because I know of the tragedy to come- but as a stand alone image, the look in this woman's eye I recognise. I have witnessed it. I have lived it.





What the fuck are you looking at?


unresolved #1


unresolved #2



One is not born a woman
Rather one becomes a woman
Simone de Beauvoir



What does it mean to be a woman? What does it mean to be seen as a woman? How do I exist under the title of woman?

I am a woman who was a girl in the 1970.s, a teenager in the 1980,s, a young woman in the 1990's and in keeping in accordance to the specific titles given at one's times of life, approaching middle age in the 2000,s. (if i sound resentful i don't mean to)_

During the 1970's I was often referred to as a 'tom-boy', since unlike my little sister who liked playing ' houses' with her dolls and going to great lengths in organising tea-party's with home made plasticine fairy cakes baked straight from the plastic mock oven, I liked to wear a cowboy a hat. Whilst walking around woolies (adorning my cowboy hat) with my mum during our regular Saturday afternoon shopping jaunts, i would trail behind her so that she wouldn't see me practice my bow-legged swagger courtesy of 'Wild Bill Hickock' as depicted in Calamity Jane that I was beginning to master to a tee.

My mum well aware of my cowboy fantasies (that of wanting to be one and not shag one) that sometimes morphed into another bow-legged fav',' Starsky ' (as in Starsky and Hutch) left me alone to explore and grapple with this thing of gender identification.

With the use of photographs my aim is to explore cliches of female identity , the 'feminine' of the female as commoditise by the fashion industry and the like. Female as provocateur contrived by the photographer who in turn is sold out to any number of marketing agencies. The women in my photographs are present. I have deliberately chosen strong and confronting poses to highlight the presence in what is normally absent.

The photographs are colour transparencies, or 'trannies' as they are now referred to in the professional photographic world (so i hear anyway) are contained within the light-boxes and are therefore not visible as yet on this electronic ether. I have instead added my photogrpahic preamble to the making of what was to become 'The Peep Show'.

Take a peep!



Peep Show.


Peep Show.

Contact/unresolved


unresovled #3

unresovled #4

2 comments:

  1. Wow, that was tops Lesley. What an expression of oneself ! Cowboy hats rock ! your phrase 'wanting to be one, not shag one' absolutely made me chuckle :) Nice work.

    Suzie

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