Up Close & Pink But Up Close – I wanted to redirect my practice back to these pieces see below. These were something I started to work on before Congruous exhibition and kept on hold while I completed the exhibition. However, I did decided to enter a few pieces into the virtual exhibition Lockdown and Light.
Reflection 03/02/21: Congruous Exhibition has made me want to continue this immersive installation outcome for this work – like Risk and Maclean’s installations, visually sensory?
For Lockdown and Light I decided to take the images further by projecting them into the bath. Previously in Just a Ripple – a photograph from a series from December – was so effective with not only the impact it had on the imagery in the water, but the image on the wall of the shower too, it gave layers and texture to the image. I wanted to explore it more. See previously photography below:
This environment of this imagery is what spurred on thoughts for Lockdown and Light submission. Also as previously mentioned there’s this appeal with women being presented by Hollywood cinema, as Mulvey directs, for their “to-be-looked-at-ness” (Mulvey, 1973, p66), women are often placed by/in a pool to be sexualised to direct the gaze of the male. With this comes, skimpy bikinis, wet skin and idealised forms in the realms of the cinema. So, I wanted to challenge this by placing these photographs of the natural form out of clay, a raw/real visual of the female form, and put it into an unusual and often ‘sexualised’ setting.
Why use pink? The pink lighting, as commented on in my Are You Watching? as part of the Congruous exhibition, created a feminine and seductive yet beautiful environment for the form to be placed in. – I have continued this with the projection, it changes the whole aura of the bath/space. Almost making it a welcoming environment – does it welcome the gaze? The self-gaze or the male gaze?
See images below from the projection of Pink But Up Close and Up Close in bath. I really enjoyed this! I felt excited to get capturing these. I began with Up Close – I filled the bath up half way to project into, I liked that the water began to disrupt the image very slightly, as well as stretch the image across and around the bath. The bubbles on the bottom of the bath, added to the visual of the stomach of form as well as the wetness of the body. Added texture and accentuated the peculiar angles of the figure.
- The yellow/green colour made the body feel slightly grotesque/weird. Completely different perception to all the pink colour bouncing off the bath.
I then photographed Pink But Up Close, the vibrant pink surrounding the environment, made it burst out of the bath. Does the colour pink romanticise the form? There’s also positioning the figure in the imagery appearing bigger than you – often its the male holding the hierarchy of power. Below, I disturbed the water and it caused the a ripple effect on the body – like Saville’s work except she uses her hands to disrupt the form.
- I like that the water does this to the projection of the image and not the originality of the image – the image almost remains untouched…?
The ripples captured through photography were also captured through film. They begin to introduce an abstraction of the projection. Water/pools accentuate insecurities in women that we may place on ourselves when we are under the realms of the gaze. Whether that is the gaze of our own, or the male gaze.
Pink But Up Close [bath projection]
Pink But Up Close [bath projection 2]
Details of Pink But Up Close [bath projection 3]
Bubbles/Details of Pink But up Close [bath projection 4]
Slow motion is something I have never worked with before. The slow film focuses in on the disruption of the body to where the water is falling, below. Also Hollywood films use slow motion as a way to sexualise the women, e.g. Baywatch – they make women run, wet and in bikinis, the slow motion captures the natural movement of the female form as you move. “Baywatch” is riddled with sexism” (Giarrusso, 2017) and the male gaze. The fact this was a 2017 remake of the famous series Baywatch, it’s still so outdate “The female lifeguards wear incredibly revealing swimsuits that aren’t at all realistic, are very objectifying, and in fact seem quite impractical for someone of that profession” (Giarrusso, 2017).
NOTE: It does welcome thoughts from Maisie Cousins practice of grass, peony, bum see below, where she highlights the natural aspects of women. As I have also said previously, Cousins work is questioned to be abjection which I believe it is in some way. As she explores the female form in its natural grotesque glory with body hair it shows the normality of the form, from an unusual angle of the form.
I think there is this relation to the way I show the female form, even tho the form isn’t scrawling with slugs or actually wetting my work – the lighting makes it appear visually wet and juxtaposed with the pink lighting, makes this intensified, creating it own forms of abjection. Is it uncomfortable to look at? Is it weird? Or, is it pretty? Glorifying of the form?
